


Adventures are Missions Without Clear Goals

by Benjinator12



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:48:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 25,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23364967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Benjinator12/pseuds/Benjinator12
Summary: It is Era 1.Tsavorite is a high-ranking garnet in the court of White Diamond, an enforcer tasked with upholding the strict discipline of the empire. When she is ordered to assist Pink Diamond with a mutiny on a space station, she uncovers a plot that threatens the entire empire- and Tsavorite and her companion Star Sapphire are the only gems that can stop it.Chapter 7 onwards contains spoilers for the SUF finale.
Comments: 9
Kudos: 21





	1. A Hundred and Sixty Acres

An ambient heat warning popped up on the display, but Tsavorite waved her hand and closed it.

“The warning is correct,” said the thin blue gem from her seat next to Tsavorite. “You'll find it unpleasant.”

Tsavorite moved for the hatch and gestured towards the dispenser, which draped her in a heat-resistant cloak. 

“I am familiar with the unpleasant, Star Sapphire,” replied the tall green gem. “Stay here and watch the ship. I will attend to this quickly.”

“You won’t be long,” smiled Star Sapphire, cocking her head to the side as she leaned back in her seat.

Tsavorite pointed at the floor, and the ship responded, sealing her in a pressurized chamber and lowering her through the hull onto the planet’s surface. The raging orange glow of lava surrounded her on all sides, but thin pathways of denser, cooler material had congealed to give her a route. The airlock lifted back up into the ship, and searing air blasted her from all directions. She felt herself falling backwards, but instead leaned forward into the wind and grimaced against the intangible assault. She waved a hand in front of her face and summoned her visor, taking a moment to reduce the glare from the molten rocks. She smiled as a tiny spitting chunk buried itself in her cheek. Star Sapphire was never wrong. She held the cloak tightly to herself and advanced out onto the lake, towards the dark silhouette pressed against a distant mountain.

The lava lapped at the sides of the hardened stone, occasionally hurling itself over the black rocks and joining them. Tsavorite pressed onwards, stepping over these obstacles, until she reached solid land again. Crouching in the shadow of the mountain like some foul organic insect was a dropship, stained with soot and hardened igneous deposits. Beside it, a few stones had been arranged into something resembling a wall, crudely placed to stop the blast of hot air from the lake. Tsavorite headed for the shelter, but stopped. She exhaled, stepped to the right, and a boulder crashed into the black stone where she had been standing.

“All right, that’s enough,” called out a roaring voice from above. “Don’t come any closer!”

Tsavorite saw a shadow shift against the dark mountain, temporarily illuminated by lava flows. A huge Gem, dark gray, with hair as vibrant as the molten rock around her, stood next to a cracked spire of stone and scowled down at her.

“What hospitality,” said Tsavorite, tapping the side of her visor. “You must be the Obsidian who took that ship.”

“Yeah, I did,” the Obsidian growled. “It’s there, ain’t it?”

“That it is,” Tsavorite noted, looking back over her shoulder at the spacecraft before returning her attention to her assailant. “So what convinced you to do something like that?”

The obsidian stood still, her hair whipped by the tumult of volcanic wind. Her hand was poised to snap another chunk of basalt and hurl it at the garnet, but she paused.

“What?” she asked.

“Why did you do it?” Tsavorite reiterated.

Stunned, the obsidian took a moment to reply.

“I… worked on a White Diamond kindergarten world just two jumps from here. They made me to dig canyons.”

“Go on,” said Tsavorite.

“I’ve been digging canyons for… eons. And one day I looked up and saw that I was just putting holes in things. I tried digging another but I couldn’t. I just wanted to stop. So I took the ship and went here.”

“And what did you plan to do while you were here?”

“Just sit around… the lava, the way it moves just looks nice. I’ve been watching it.”

“Right, of course,” said Tsavorite, placing a hand on the side of her visor, ending the recording. “So your defect is a lack of motivation.”

“Wait, what?”

Tsavorite unclasped her cloak, which immediately whipped away in the rushing winds. Burning droplets singed her pale green form, but she knew she would need her mobility. She reached to her left hip and paused with her hand hovering over her gem. She cleared her mind and felt the weight of her twinblade fill her palm. She extended the weapon ahead with a flourish.

“Surrender yourself, or I’ll take you to the Diamonds by force.”

“Do you think I’m just going to let you take away what I found here?” roared the obsidian. “I don’t care what the Diamonds do to me. I won’t give this up, not over my shattered gem!”

Tsavorite readied a fighting stance. “So be it.”

The green garnet exploded off the ground, rocketing up towards the obsidian. The obsidian, enraged, smashed the stone next to her, hurling the chunks at the approaching Tsavorite. The green gem spun her twinblade and sliced the first projectile into shards, then swung her body around into a kick that knocked the second rock into the third, turning both into dust that obscured the obsidian’s vision. Tsavorite burst through the other side of the cloud and swung her blade towards the gem’s head, only for the obsidian to block the attack with a massive arm. The gray gem hurled Tsavorite aside, flinging her into the stark stone of the mountain.

“Got you,” she screamed, charging toward the downed garnet. Tsavorite looked up at the approaching juggernaut and managed to curl downwards, dodging the impact of a massive fist. She darted out, ducking beneath the giant to flank her. Between the heavy, broad shoulders was a twinkling, black stone. Her target.

“Quit running,” the obsidian roared, turning to face Tsavorite again. She extracted her fist from the stone and flung it open towards the garnet, hurling more rocks her way. Tsavorite stood her ground and twisted the twinblade at its center, splitting the weapon into two identical halves. With a flurry of slices, she atomized the incoming debris. 

“Fine,” replied the green gem. “I’ll stand right here.”

“Good,” said the obsidian, a manic grin hiding her desperation. “It’ll make it easier to smash ya!”

The obsidian burst forth in a charge, rushing towards the garnet. Tsavorite lowered into a fighting stance once again, bringing both of her blades to the ready, but otherwise keeping still. The massive gem hurtled towards her, raising her arms as she approached. She cupped a fist in an open hand above her head, preparing a double axe-handle that would easily poof even the fanciest Homeworld garnet. She reached her target, carrying all of her momentum with her, and began to swing downwards. Tsavorite dropped to her knees, reconnected her blades, and pushed forward, stopping the obsidian’s ankles in their place. The rest of her body kept going, eventually dragging her feet along, as she tripped over the garnet and down the mountain, into the edge of the lake of lava below. Even before she turned around, Tsavorite knew her strategy had been successful from the bellows of pain echoing up. She gracefully slid down the mountain to find her quarry half-submerged in the lava, her legs below the surface, her upper body still flailing above, destabilizing at its edges. Tsavorite decided to end her misery, and ran the obsidian through on her twinblade. In a flash of orange light, her body retreated back into the gem, which Tsavorite caught with the flat of the blade and bounced back into her waiting palm. She produced a pale green bubble, and sent the gem into holding. The garnet picked up her cloak, and walked back to her waiting ship.

The cool interior was a relief, and Tsavorite was eager to sink back into her captain’s chair.

“Oh, that was even shorter than I anticipated,” said Star Sapphire, not sounding surprised at all. “Did you trip her down the cliff?”

“Yes,” grunted Tsavorite, picking a clump of basalt from her hair.

“It was one of the more efficient outcomes. You produce a lot of those,” Star Sapphire continued, smiling as she brushed aside her bangs to blink at her superior. 

“Efficiency is a virtue. What I can do efficiently makes up for the failings of those like our obsidian friend.”

“Ah,” said Star Sapphire, reclining. “You’re so stoic.”

“Plot a course for Homeworld. We’ll need deliver our captive to the Diamond Authority at once and report on the mission.”

“Plotting the course,” said Star Sapphire, “but the report won’t be necessary. You’re about to get a call.”

The ship lurched to hyperspeed, and Tsavorite dusted herself off once more. She then crossed to the central display as the hailing indicator lit up. She gestured and opened the display window. Towering above in the feed was a stark white figure. Tsavorite formed her most luminescent salute.

“My Diamond,” she said with genuflection.

“Ah, Tsavorite,” White Diamond cooed, leaning closer towards the feed. Tsavorite could hear Star Sapphire attempt to scoot further away. She did not blame the corundum- a Diamond’s presence was overwhelming, intimidating. Tsavorite had simply grown used to it. “I take it you’ve completed that… errand I needed you to run?”

“All according to procedure, my Diamond. When I return to Homeworld, I will present you with your prisoner and all evidence needed for sentencing.”

“Oh, wonderful. You know, what you’re doing is very important. Everything needs to radiate with perfect, luminous symmetry. But sometimes, little imperfections crop up. All they need is--”

“A little polish,” said Tsavorite. “I could not agree more, my Diamond.”

On the feed, White Diamond rested her head on her hands. “After you return to Homeworld, I have another errand for you to run.”

“Of course, my Diamond.”

“Pink says she’s been having some trouble with discipline on one of her space stations. Do you think you could be a dear and give her a hand? Once you’ve finished everything else?”

Tsavorite nodded. “It would be my pleasure, my Diamond.”

“Good. I’ll see you soon.”

The feed ended, and Tsavorite sunk back into her captain’s chair. Star Sapphire beamed.

“You weren’t expecting that, were you?”

“No, I was not,” said Tsavorite.

“A job for Pink Diamond? Oh, this will turn out interesting.”

“I wouldn’t use that word. Maybe, ‘disastrous.’ Or ‘infuriating,’” the garnet fumed.

“The speech you’re about to give won’t make this any less interesting,” Star Sapphire warned.

“My loyalty to the diamonds is absolute,” said Tsavorite, rising to pace around the cabin. “But my time in their court has told me one thing-- Pink Diamond is going to make this insufferable.”

“Or you could view it as an… adventure?” Star Sapphire suggested.

“Adventures are missions without clear goals,” Tsavorite stated. “Without clear goals, they are doomed to fail.”

“So, so stoic,” said Star Sapphire, biting her lip.


	2. Running Gun

Star Sapphire struggled to keep up with Tsavorite’s fuming march down the halls of the palace.

“I can tell you’re excited about this,” she said coyly.

“I am the opposite of excited about this,” Tsavorite snapped. “My efforts are about to be wasted.”

Star Sapphire slowed for a moment, then floated forwards at her top speed to catch up with her garnet. “Things are about to become quite awkward. Be careful.”

Tsavorite looked back over her shoulder as she turned the corner. “What’s that supposed to--”

“Look, it’s really fine-- it’ll all work out,” said a familiar voice from above. Tsavorite stopped in her tracks, and looked into the room she had entered. It was some lesser dance hall, furnished exclusively in pink. Standing in the center were White and Pink Diamond.

“No, I insist that you let me take control of this,” said White Diamond, scowling down at the smaller Diamond. “You’ve proven that this kind of responsibility is above you.” The larger gem noticed Tsavorite enter and looked her way.

“Ah, what’s this? If it isn’t my Tsavorite! Come here, if you please,” cooed White Diamond.

“Yes, my Diamond,” yelped Tsavorite, rushing to the center of the room and saluting. 

White Diamond gave Tsavorite a wink and returned her attention to her fellow Diamond. “Oh, Pink, did you know that Tsavorite is an expert in disciplinary measures? Why, she could even help you!”

Pink looked down at the garnet, embarrassment evident on her face. “I don’t know if that’s necessary, White--”

“Either you’ll work with Tsavorite, or I’ll do it for you, while you take a respite in the tower,” White Diamond threatened.

“F-fine, I’ll work with Tsavorite,” Pink sighed. 

“Oh, I’m glad to see you’ve come around to the idea,” grinned White Diamond, turning to leave. “And if I hear about any trouble you give Tsavorite… you’ll take a respite in the tower anyway!”

With a flourish, White Diamond departed the room, leaving Tsavorite and Pink Diamond to exchange glances. Star Sapphire floated up behind Tsavorite, leaning forward to whisper in her ear.

“See what I meant?”

Tsavorite simply grimaced, and under her breath, hissed “Salute.”

“Oh, yeah. My Diamond,” said Star Sapphire, saluting.

Pink Diamond groaned and fell to her knees, then crossed her legs on the floor and pouted.

“This isn’t fair. I’m a Diamond, and White thinks I can’t handle anything on my own.”

Tsavorite rolled her eyes and cleared her throat. “My Diamond, what exactly is the problem?”

“It’s not as big of a deal as White thinks. I just want to get that out of the way,” Pink sighed. “And you don’t have to keep saluting like that.”

“Of course, my Diamond.”

“You’re still-- oh, never mind. The problem is on the Galaxy Refractor.”

“I’ve never heard of a Galaxy Refractor,” said Star Sapphire.

“Well… that’s because I was trying to keep it a secret,” said Pink, smiling. “I had a great plan, too. Blue, Yellow, and White have been planning a big ball for a while, and they plan on making this speech about the progress of the empire, and how they want to begin colonizing this new galaxy they found… so, naturally, I’ve been planning a prank.”

Tsavorite worked hard to contain her rage. “Continue, my Diamond,” she said, forcing a smile.

“I had this space station built, with all the gizmos-- it’s covered in mirrors, to reflect light. While the other diamonds are giving their big speech, I would have used it to create a big light show! Everyone would be watching it instead of listening to them. It could’ve been great.”

“And what exactly happened, my Diamond,” said Tsavorite, gritting her teeth.

“Well, I put an Emerald named Trapiche in charge of the station- I told her that she and her crew could work on whatever they needed to there, until the ball, but when I hailed the station again, Trapiche said they weren’t taking orders from me anymore.”

Tsavorite could not help but raise her voice. “To clarify, my Diamond, you’re saying that the  _ entire crew _ of this station mutinied?”

“I don’t know about that. But if you could find out about it and take care of it for me, I’d be very grateful. And don’t hurt anyone if you don’t have to.”

Tsavorite’s eyelid spasmed in frustration. “Of course, my Diamond. If you could just give me the coordinates--”

Tsavorite could not finish before the diamond had scooped her up into a hug. “Oh, thank you-- look, I was mad at White Diamond earlier but the truth is I don’t know what to do and--”

“PUT ME DOWN!” Tsavorite screamed, having finally lost her composure.

Pink Diamond quickly dropped the garnet and backed away. “Sorry-- some people need space-- I think I get it-- I’ll just send those coordinates to your ship,” she said, flustered. She scrambled to her feet and left Tsavorite and Star Sapphire in the room alone.

“You look so much better when you’re stoic,” Star Sapphire sighed.

“Excuse me?” asked Tsavorite, already stunned by recent events.

“Oh, nothing,” Star Sapphire replied. “You want to head to the ship?”

“Anything to get out of this place,” Tsavorite groaned.

* * *

The hatch closed behind them, and Star Sapphire headed for the central console, beginning preparations for launch. Tsavorite gestured towards the back wall of the cabin, and a storage compartment opened for her. Inside was a collection of weapons and supplies, which she considered carefully. 

“I still don’t see how she’s a diamond at all,” Tsavorite huffed as she examined a compact long-range communicator, shaped like a Pearl’s shell. 

“Because she  _ is _ a diamond,” said Star Sapphire. “Cut and carat and everything.”

“I suppose,” Tsavorite admitted. “Perhaps gems even that brilliant can have flaws.”

“Perhaps,” Star Sapphire echoed back with a smile. “Coordinates are locked in. Are you ready for this?”

“The whole station? Don’t be silly. We’re going to find out exactly what’s going on, and once we know, drown this station in quartzes.”

“And after that, an evening in?”

“Of course not,” said Tsavorite, lowering herself into her captain’s chair. “There will be more work to do then.  _ Better _ work. Now let’s get this over with.”

Star Sapphire nodded and pushed their ship to hyperspeed. The stars turned into a twinkling blur as they raced onward, but only for a moment, as they returned to clarity quite abruptly. 

The ship jolted forwards, throwing Star Sapphire from her seat and into the control panel, on which she poofed immediately. With one hand, Tsavorite braced herself to avoid a similar fate, and the other she used to catch Star Sapphire’s tumbling gem. The garnet winced in pain, ascertaining what she could as she recovered from the shock. The station was visible through the bridge of the ship, though more distant than their jump should have taken them. It was far above them instead, and the controls began blaring altitude warnings. The haze of an atmosphere was beginning to rise into view. They were falling towards a planet. Impact in seconds. She weighed her options and acted on the first viable strategy. She held Star Sapphire’s gem close and curled herself into a ball, shapeshifting herself to resist impact. The whole ship rushed at her at once.

When Tsavorite came back to her senses, she was in the back corner of the ship, against the ceiling. She gave her physical form a cursory evaluation-- integrity good, gem intact. In her grip was Star Sapphire, reduced to her brilliant blue stone. The windows had been blown out, and some native plant, a hard, spearlike thing, had run through the centerline of the ship, nearly bisecting it. The drive had to be dead. Tsavorite pushed herself up to her feet.

The hailing alert crackled on through the half-functional ship display. Tsavorite stumbled towards the console and gestured to receive the call.

“Hello, whoever’s out there, this is GES  _ Dark Matter _ , requesting assistance. We’ve just crash-landed and--”

“Oh ho ho,  _ Dark Matter _ ? You’re still alive?” crackled the response. The display conjured only a vague silhouette, but the tone of the voice was not friendly. “That’s too bad. For you, I mean.”

Tsavorite had not felt fear often, but she could feel something begin to surround her gem with discomfort, a gnawing anxiety.

“Just who do you think you are?”

“I’m a nice host, so I’m going to greet you at the door. I am Trapiche, and on behalf of the Galaxy Gems, welcome to Chatoyan 4. You’ll be staying for a while.”

Tsavorite hunkered down over the console, shifting glances outside the ship, waiting for an ambush.

“Do you think you’re going to get away with this?”

Laughter, from many sources, could be heard through the feed.

“Ah, but didn’t we already? What exactly are you threatening us with?”

“As part of White Diamond’s court, I could have a flotilla of battlecruisers decimate your station in the blink of an eye. I could send a legion of amethysts to crush your gems to dust!”

“You  _ could _ do that, if you had long-range communication. But we’ve already seen to it that you don’t,” the voice paused, perhaps stifled a giggle, then continued. “Let me lay this out for you. There is one,  _ one _ warp pad on that planet. It’s linked to the  _ one _ warp pad on this station. If you want off of there, you come see me. And we’re going to have a little talk if you do.”

“ _ If _ I do?”

“Well, you’ll have to get through the Galaxy Gems stationed planet-side. Do that, and we’ll see if you don’t change my mind. Unless we change yours.”

The transmission sputtered out, and Tsavorite backed away from the console, her head swimming. She was stuck on a hostile planet filled with rebel gems, and her only way out was through a hostile space station  _ also _ filled with rebel gems. Dealing with rebel gems was, of course, Tsavorite’s purpose, but this was something new. She was on their turf now. To them, she was the rebel. Tsavorite returned to the storage compartment and selected a few items, before lowering herself along the cabin to a space of shattered window. She wiggled herself through and onto the planet’s surface. A few clicks away, a dust storm rolled along an endless plain, static lighting scouring the wasteland in its wake. Tsavorite looked down into her palm at the dormant Star Sapphire, and coiled her fingers tightly around her.

If it was a war they wanted, they would regret it.


	3. Cool Water

Biting sand tore at her as Tsavorite pressed forwards into the storm, still shielding Star Sapphire from the elements. Through the hail of particles Tsavorite could make out her destination; a carved cave entrance cut into a cliffside. She had ventured far enough that the ship was long gone over the horizon-- the only shelter they were going to find was likely hostile. That was the harsh reality of their situation. She ducked into the cave and dropped to her knees in exhaustion. Feverishly, she turned Star Sapphire over in her hands, her asterism still glowing in the faint light from outside.

“Why didn’t you warn me about this, huh?” Tsavorite breathed, smiling faintly. “It’s not like you to let me get into trouble like this.”

Tsavorite took a moment to survey the cave. It was clearly artificial, designed as a tunnel. To her right, the cave twisted downwards. Glyphs along the walls read “SECONDARY MINE ENTRANCE.” Tsavorite frowned. This system wasn’t colonized. It was technically one of Yellow Diamond’s holdings, but the planets lacked proper mineral distribution for kindergartens. So how did the facility get here? Tsavorite had more pressing concerns. If there was a warp pad on this planet, it was likely surrounded by some kind of facility. That meant the mine warranted further investigation. She dusted herself off, and searched her gem’s limited storage. Finding what she wanted, she extracted her cloak and tied it into a sling, into which she nestled Star Sapphire. At times like this, she almost wished she had a Pearl along to carry her gear, but Tsavorite was certain she wouldn’t tolerate one of those dainty, glitzy trinkets for long. They just weren’t very practical for anything besides storage. 

“Nothing a Pearl could do that a little ingenuity couldn’t,” she said, pleased with her craftsmanship. Thus prepared, Tsavorite descended into the mine. The mine shaft had been dug out quickly, without the clean work of a sanctioned operation. A set of tracks ran down the center line of the shaft, which Tsavorite avoided, keeping to the left wall. Eventually, the incline levelled out, opening into a subterranean pit. The garnet dove into a shadow as she heard footsteps approaching.

A mass of five rubies stomped past the mine shaft, carrying heavy machinery. All of them wore additional protective gear, marked with a spiral galaxy insignia.

“You think we’re gonna find any good stuff today?” asked one.

“Nah, everything we’re finding’s all gross,” replied another.

“Even when we do find some clean ore, the boss just tosses it,” added a third.

“That’s because they don’t need it anymore,” said the fourth. “Not for what we’re making now.”

“Have you all ever noticed that we’re underground?” asked the fifth. The rest turned back to give her a glare.

“I mean,” she protested, “don’t you think that’s weird?”

“Let’s just set up this drill,” said the first.

“Better to get to work sooner,” agreed the second.

“If we find any nice ore I’m keeping it,” noted the third.

“We want to meet our quota,” added the fourth.

“Come on, guys, think about it!” demanded the fifth, as the rubies continued onwards.

Their idiocy was to be expected, but rubies weren’t suited for mine work. It just wasn’t their purpose. These so-called “Galaxy Gems” had already demonstrated a clear lack of respect for the authority of their diamond, but it seemed they were also ignorant of caste and role as well. Tsavorite remained hidden and watched as they assembled their machinery into a drill and began to dig away at the pit wall. Taking advantage of the noise, she darted around behind them, pressing on further into the mine. A service ramp led up out of the pit, split by tracks similar to those from before, which Tsavorite followed, keeping a low profile. The tracks entered another tunnel, which quickly widened into a depot. Multiple mine carts were arranged on parallel tracks, stopped by buffers. The path opened up ahead of Tsavorite into what looked like a forge. A quick glance inside one of the carts revealed it was full of ore-- loaded with impurities, just as the rubies had suggested. Tsavorite picked up a chunk of ore and examined it-- it was inferior, certainly unfit for forging a blade. She dropped beneath a cart when a large silhouette, illuminated by the fires of the forge, entered the depot. A scraping crunch was heard as the gem extracted some ore from one of the carts and stomped back towards the forge. Tsavorite ducked into the next room and hid behind a furnace pipe. Two bismuths hammered away at molten metal, forming a thin sheet. A third carried the sheets away, placing them in another cart on the other side of the room. It was an assembly line, Tsavorite realized. But what were they planning on building with inferior materials? Certainly blades couldn’t be made out of thin sheets like that. 

An amethyst entered from the next chamber and rolled the cart filled with metal sheets onwards, and Tsavorite followed when the third bismuth returned for more sheets. The amethyst moved on through the tunnel until it opened into a noisy and well-lit workshop filled with busy gems. Tsavorite took careful note of the layout of the room, and, after seeing that there weren’t any routes with broken sightlines, decided to adopt a different strategy. She whistled.

“Who’s the-” said the amethyst, only barely managing to turn around before being impaled on the twinblade. She poofed immediately, and Tsavorite quickly bubbled the gem as she fell, rolling it into a dark corner. The garnet focused and shapeshifted, doing her best to approximate the form of the amethyst. She then pushed the cart out into the workshop, where the tracks led it to a workbench filled with bixbites cutting complex patterns into the metal. After they did so, they handed the cut sheets to rubies, who punched the shapes out of the sprue. A quartet of peridots arranged the shapes into stout, rectangular forms. A glyph caught Tsavorite’s eye and she turned to find the far wall of the workshop adorned with writing. “APPLY BACKING. SPREAD METAL THINLY. APPLY FINISH. APPLY GLASS,” it read, clear instructions for workers. Above the words was large artwork of a figure pointing at the finished product, which reflected her distinct appearance.

“Pink Diamond,” Tsavorite hissed under her breath. It made sense-- Pink couldn’t run her own colony, but she could ask to set up something as innocuous as a mirror factory on one of Yellow’s leftover planets. But these Galaxy Gems weren’t making mirrors.

“I say, Amethyst,” said a voice from behind. Tsavorite turned, ready to assemble a convincing bluff, but decided not to speak when she noticed she was held at spear-point. “Don’t you have somewhere else to be?” asked the gem. She was of average height, but stout build, and wore a gray uniform with a galaxy insignia over tan skin. A swirling gray-and-tan gem accented her chin, framed by shaped bangs resembling a helmet. An agate, Tsavorite noted, flanked by two gray jaspers. The jaspers carried the rectangular devices she had seen the peridots assembling. 

“I take it you’re in charge here,” said Tsavorite, shifting into her default form. 

“How observant. Coldwater Agate, if you please,” said the agate, offering a short and irreverent curtsy. “You must be the guest Trapiche told us to expect, and my oh my, a Tsavorite? I should have dressed for the occasion.”

“That’s enough prattle. You know why I’m here.”

Coldwater Agate grinned. “You’re trying to find the Warp pad out of here, aren’t you? Well, I’ve got some bad news. It’s not here. There’s two more facilities between you and that warp pad. I’d gladly take you straight there, in a bubble.”

“I don’t like those terms,” said Tsavorite stoically.

“You aren’t exactly in a bargaining position,” said Coldwater Agate. 

“I am,” said Tsavorite. “You have no guards and have been disarmed.”

“I haven’t the foggiest idea what you--” Coldwater Agate was interrupted as Tsavorite wrenched the spear from the agate’s hands and slashed into one jasper before drawing her twinblade and hurling it at the second jasper, pinning her to a wall before she poofed. The gems in the workshop ducked for cover.

“...what you’re saying,” mumbled Coldwater Agate, stumbling backwards, hardly able to make out what had happened through the garnet’s immense speed.

“So let’s review my bargaining posture,” smirked Tsavorite. “You have no guards, and are disarmed.”

Coldwater Agate regained her composure. “You’re only partially correct, my dear.” She reached for her gem as light poured forth, taking on a long, rectangular form. She rested the completed weapon in the crook of her shoulder, pointing its length towards Tsavorite. “I’m not disarmed.”

Tsavorite twisted out of the way as a blast rang out, a white-hot beam of light lancing into the workshop’s far wall. 

“Impressed, aren’t you? Even your speed won’t be enough to evade this blaster rifle forever,” cackled Coldwater Agate, lining up another shot. Tsavorite juked right, ducking behind a workbench for cover as another blast rang out overhead. A ruby, who had already been hiding behind the same bench, drew a small knife in defense. Ignoring the weapon, Tsavorite grabbed the diminutive gem by her uniform and hurled her up out of cover as she dashed towards her twinblades. Surprised by the movement, Coldwater Agate fired again, punching a hole through the ruby before the gem dissolved into light. 

“Fiddlesticks,” she swore, moving Tsavorite back into her sights. By now the garnet had reached the twinblade and removed it from the wall, turning it as it loosened to deflect another blast from the rifle, which bounced across the room and popped a bixbite’s head into sparkles. The blades glowed with heat from the impact, their physical forms beginning to destabilize.

“These blasters take less time and resources to produce than the old style of weapons,” the agate cooed as smoke trailed from the barrel of her rifle. “And it takes less training to produce a crack shot than a master of the sword or axe. A ruby can be as deadly as a jasper with one.”

“So you’re planning on building an army,” Tsavorite grunted.

“Planning? Oh, love, we already have it! And you and your backwards Diamonds aren’t going to have a chance at stopping us!”

“Once I’m back on Homeworld, I’ll make sure you and your army are decimated!” screamed Tsavorite, charging at the agate in anger. She split her twinblades and brought both edges down on Coldwater at once, but the rebel gem blocked both with the length of the rifle.

“Don’t you get it? When we’re done here,  _ there won’t be a Homeworld! _ ” Coldwater Agate taunted, forcing the barrel of the rifle back down, and knocking Tsavorite’s weapons from her hands. With a firm kick, she sent the garnet crashing back through a row of workbenches, poofing the remaining cowering gems in the process. Tsavorite’s sling, loosened by the attack, slipped off, with Star Sapphire bouncing across the room. Tsavorite, dazed by the attack, desperately fumbled for her missing sling, before weakly pushing herself up into a sitting position.

“Don’t bother,” taunted Coldwater Agate, kicking the garnet back to the floor before holding her down with her boot. The agate aimed the barrel of the rifle squarely at Tsavorite’s face. “You lost the moment you jumped into this system. The old order of the Diamonds has gone on long enough. We’re going to create a new Era, where every gem works towards a unified goal, and no one will have to slave under the whims of decadent leaders! Where every gem controls their own destiny! Where--”

Coldwater Agate’s enthusiasm was dampened by the sudden appearance of a hole through her chest.

“Oh,” she gasped, before poofing. Tsavorite caught her gem and bubbled it immediately.

“Wow,” said Star Sapphire, crossing the room to Tsavorite and offering a hand. In her other hand was a smoking blaster, which Tsavorite recognized as having been carried by one of the jasper guards. “These  _ are _ easy to use.”

“You’re all right,” Tsavorite exclaimed.

“Yeah,” Star Sapphire said, spinning around and admiring her newly-regenerated body, with its shoulder cape and short skirt. “I saw a lot of ways that fight could end, and you were heading down one of the pretty bad paths, so I decided to intervene.”

“You knew about this,” said Tsavorite, picking up her twinblades.

“Yeah, I could still see the fight going on,” Star Sapphire chirped, moving over to the garnet. 

“No, I mean you knew about  _ all _ of this. The Galaxy Gems, the crash. You had to.”

“Oh,” Star Sapphire said. “That. Look, sometimes the future is murky and I don’t always--”

“You  _ wanted _ this to happen, didn’t you?” said Tsavorite, gritting her teeth. “You wanted to go on an  _ adventure _ .”

“I wanted to go with you!” Star Sapphire shouted, stunning the garnet, who had never heard the thin blue gem raise her voice. “You always go and do your missions alone! And you’re  _ always _ doing your missions. So I just thought that if we were stuck here, we could spend some time  _ together! _ ” 

“And  _ this _ is how you decided to do that?” roared Tsavorite, balling her fists in rage.

Star Sapphire rose to her tip-toes to attempt to “Yes! Because you wouldn’t do it any other way! Because the only thing you think is important in life  _ is your job! _ ”

Tsavorite, seething, prepared to shout back a response, but couldn’t think of anything to say. Even though the battle was over, it was this fight that had worn her out. She felt an aching pain, not radiating from her physical form, but from in her gem itself.

“I… I didn’t...” she stammered.

“You didn’t know that I felt that way,” Star Sapphire said, reaching forwards to cradle the garnet’s hand. “And I’m sorry I tell you sooner. That part is my fault.”

“Well, we’re here now,” Tsavorite sighed. “And I need to make sure you’re safe.”

“I’ve got this,” Star Sapphire said, motioning to the blaster. Suddenly, she raised it at Tsavorite, who already felt vulnerable enough.

“What are you doing?” she yelped.

Star Sapphire pulled the trigger and shot a beam of light through the space between Tsavorite’s left arm and her torso, zapping a regenerated jasper back into her gem.

Star Sapphire blushed. “Maybe… you need  _ me _ to keep  _ you _ safe.”

“We work best as a team,” said Tsavorite, having turned to watch the jasper’s gem hit the floor. “All right. Together.”

Star Sapphire collapsed the blaster into her gem, readying it for future summoning. “All right. I’ll lead the way.”

“You?”

“I can see the future, remember?”

“That does give you an advantage,” Tsavorite admitted. “Go on then.”

With Star Sapphire at point, the two gems followed a path through the workshop to a loading dock. Tsavorite reached down for the sliding door’s handle.

“Actually, you can lead from here,” Star Sapphire interrupted.

“Giving up on it so soon? All right,” the garnet laughed. She opened the door and was pelted by the biting particles of a dust storm. 

“I’ll be right back here,” smiled Star Sapphire, taking refuge behind the larger gem. Tsavorite couldn’t help but smile, but quickly scolded herself for losing focus. This might have been an adventure, but it was still a mission. She summoned her visor and pushed on into the storm.


	4. Billy the Kid

“What do you see?” called Tsavorite from below.

“We’re nearly there. I can see the towers up ahead,” said Star Sapphire, perching on one of the spine-like plants. She pushed away from the branch and levitated to the ground gently. 

“Good,” said the garnet, heading for the path. Star Sapphire floated up alongside her.

“So what’s the plan? Going to sneak in again?”

“I would prefer a quiet operation, but they found me last time. They’ll only be more suspicious now. These Galaxy Gems may be defective, but they aren’t stupid. Except the rubies, they  _ are _ stupid.”

“So we charge in?”

“There’s too many of them. And assuming the rest of their commanders are as powerful as Coldwater Agate, that’s a battle we may not be able to win.”

Star Sapphire spun to face Tsavorite, floating backwards as the garnet walked ahead. 

“So then how  _ are _ we going to do it?”

“Guerrilla tactics. Hit and run,” Tsavorite explained. “We need to observe this facility first, and determine if it is likely to contain the warp pad. If it doesn’t, we need to find information on the final facility’s location, whether by accessing a datalog or by interrogating one of the Galaxy Gems. Whichever it is, we’ll move in fast, get what we want, and get out. It’ll take some strategy.”

“Sounds right up our alley,” said Star Sapphire, who thought something caught her eye in the trees for a moment, but after looking back found nothing.

“I thought you’d approve.”

The gems moved up the path, until the spiny forest gave way to a rocky valley. Sheer cliffs bordered the sides, and in the center, two tall towers belching white smoke marked the facility. On Tsavorite’s instructions, the pair moved up along the cliffs before descending into the valley, using the elevation to scout. Tsavorite took a knee and used her visor to zoom in. The facility was fan-shaped in layout, consisting of smaller outlying buildings and a large central one, from which the two smokestacks emerged. Gems moved from the small buildings into the larger one and back, carrying crates and carts in but leaving empty-handed. Eventually, a large service door opened on the central building, and twenty quartzes emerged pushing a huge cargo platform to the very top edge of the fan shape, a space designated with a large “X” tiled into the ground. After unloading what seemed to be thousands of packages onto the X, the quartzes pushed the cargo platform back inside.

“That looks important,” Star Sapphire observed.

“Indeed,” Tsavorite confirmed. “More weapons, perhaps?”

“I don’t know yet,” Star Sapphire said. “But a dropship will arrive and carry those packages away.”

Tsavorite looked up from the facility. “You didn’t see any boxes like those in the mine, did you?”

“No,” Star Sapphire replied. “So they must be going…”

“... to the third facility. There were no dropships at the mine, and if they had a warp pad here, they wouldn’t need a dropship to carry whatever those are away.”

“You’re about to explain what your new plan is, but I want to hear you say it yourself,” Star Sapphire explained.

Tsavorite looked at her quizzically. “All right. We’ll board the dropship and let them take us to the final facility.”

“Oh, goodness me,” Star Sapphire moaned.

“Are you… well?” Tsavorite asked.

“Ex-tremely,” said the thin blue gem. “Let’s catch a ride.”

The two gems set off into the valley, cautiously approaching the edge of the facility. Amethysts, rubies, and some errant Rutiles walked the perimeter of the base, each carrying blasters. They routinely stopped and exchanged reports with each other, but moved on. The gaps between the patrols were razor-thin.

Tsavorite pulled her head back into cover behind the short spine plant.

“We’ll have to move fast,” the garnet warned. “I’ll carry you with me.”

“I won’t mind,” Star Sapphire said, absolutely delighting in the proximity she and Tsavorite were sharing as they hid together. She pulled herself away and looked upwards. “The dropship’s nearly here. We’ll need to be cautious of the crew.”

“Get ready,” Tsavorite said, picking up the sapphire with one hand and tucking her beneath an arm. The garnet hunkered down, ready to dash forward when the perfect moment arose. Distantly, the engines of a dropship could be heard, echoing louder as they reverberated through the valley. It kicked up dust as it hovered down over the pile of boxes, settling onto its landing gear. A cargo bay opened above the boxes, and two patrolling gems arrived to inspect the packages one last time. After a quick glance over the shipment, they waved into the dropship and moved on. 

“Now,” Tsavorite grunted, blasting forwards at full speed. Star Sapphire felt her physical form accelerate faster than it ever had before, nearly pulling away from her gem. Tsavorite was used to her own speed, and managing it with precision was one of her finer facets. But as she rushed forwards, something caught her eyes. A tall figure stood at the edge of the facility, draped in a heavy cloak. Two bright eyes glowed in the shadows filling its hood as it raised a hand to the bottom of its face and extended a single index finger upwards.

“Shhh,” it seemed to say.

Tsavorite stopped dead in her tracks, looking back at where the figure had stood. It was gone.

“What are you doing?” yelped Star Sapphire. “If you stop now, they’ll--”

Tsavorite felt something hot hit her in the stomach and looked down to find a clean circle sliced through her midsection. She attempted to hold herself together, but too much of her physical form had been lost. She collapsed back into her gem and clattered to the ground. Heavy footfalls surrounded her. 

“Got ‘em,” grunted a ruby. “What do we do?”

“Take the sapphire. Bubble the garnet,” said a jasper. Star Sapphire reached desperately for Tsavorite before being pulled away. “No, wait! Tsavorite! Tsavor--”

Everything froze.

* * *

“I didn’t… I couldn’t… oh,” sobbed Star Sapphire. Tears rolled down from her singular eye onto the green gem in her palm. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she cried.

Tsavorite, having returned to her senses, reformed, pushing herself out of Star Sapphire’s hands as she took shape. She reconstituted on her hands and knees, the warmth of the blaster shot still fading from her memory. The thin blue gem embraced her before she had a chance to take in her surroundings.

“Oh, no, I’m so sorry, I screwed up again. I was wrong. I shouldn’t have gotten you into this… this dumb adventure!”

Tsavorite wanted to return the embrace, but reminded herself that such contact with subordinates was improper. She backed away.

“You think this was… your fault?”

“I should have given you more of a warning about the crew,” she whimpered.

“No… that’s not it at all. I saw something, and stopped to look at it,” Tsavorite explained, looking around the room. It was a makeshift holding cell, some supply closet barricaded by a massive slab of metal. 

“You… you saw something?” Star Sapphire asked, holding back her tears for a moment.

“It was...a gem. Big. They wore a cloak. And they looked right at me, and shushed me.”

“Oh, who in their right mind would shush you? When your voice could melt tungsten?”

“Excuse me?”

“I-I mean,” Star Sapphire stuttered, “I saw something similar. When we were in the forest. Just a glimpse, not a good look at it.”

“We’re being watched.”

“Do you think it’s the Galaxy Gems?” asked Star Sapphire.

“That would be the most likely explanation,” Tsavorite replied. “To believe they’ve been two steps ahead of us this whole time!”

The slab of metal scraped away from the doorframe, held by a large quartz. A peridot and a bixbite, armed with blasters, stood outside.

“All right, it’s your court date,” said the peridot, gesturing for Star Sapphire and Tsavorite to leave the room.

The two gems, lacking other options, raised their hands above their heads and complied, and the guards escorted them down a hallway to a heavy blast door. Topaz guards flanked either side of the barrier.

“Have fun being the defendant for once, garnet,” chuckled the peridot as the bixbite pressed them forwards at gunpoint. The topaz guards opened the doors and shut them as soon as the gems had cleared. The room they had entered was a vast dome, with two pools of bubbling green liquid in the center. Above them, two large ventilation shafts descended from the ceiling, certainly leading to the cooling towers visible from outside. Between the pools was a congregation of gems- rubies, quartzes, and a few larimars, standing in reverence around a single colossal gem with her back turned to Tsavorite and Star Sapphire. After a bow, the gems each produced plates and panels, and began to carefully fasten them to the large central gem. After completing the suit of armor, they abandoned their physical forms, and the remaining gem bubbled every one before snapping her fingers and teleporting them elsewhere. The gem turned to face them. Her skin was a dark brownish silver, with cuboids emerging to break up her bulbous form. She was huge, towering above them even without her ornately inlaid armor. Her thick hair had been tied up beneath her helmet, but an errant strand hung down one of her cheeks, a vibrant and iridescent lock of blue, purple, and gold.

“I expected more from you,” she said, her voice like a landslide, and thick with an accent. “You are White Diamond’s little garnet, yes?”

“Tsavorite, that’s correct,” Tsavorite replied.

“Are names the best idea right now?” asked Star Sapphire quietly.

“I am Lead Bismuth,” mused the huge gray gem. “And I will be your judge. You collect the gems you call defective.”

“That is my purpose,” Tsavorite replied.

The massive bismuth stomped closer. Waves formed in the pools of green liquid with each step.

“Tell me-- what makes a gem defective?”

“When they are unable to fulfill the purpose for which they are created, or reject that purpose in rebellion against the Great Diamond Authority.”

“A very clear definition, yes. Did White Diamond give this to you?”

“Of course. The clarity should make that evident.”

Lead Bismuth leaned forwards, casting a shadow over Tsavorite and Star Sapphire.

“And all gems are either defective, or not defective, yes?”

“I fail to see the point of this interrogation,” Tsavorite spat. “If you intend to execute us, do so.”

“What?!” hissed Star Sapphire. “You can’t just  _ say _ that!”

“I am about to do something far worse than execute you, little one. I am going to open your eyes.”

“Do your worst,” said Tsavorite, drawing her twinblade.

“No! Stop saying that kind of thing!” Star Sapphire protested, summoning her blaster.

Lead Bismuth raised her hands above her head and shapeshifted them into mallets, which hurtled downwards. Tsavorite tackled Star Sapphire out of the way, skidding along the ground behind the massive gem. Star Sapphire raised the blaster and fired, and the beam hit dead-center in the giant’s back-- yet it failed to punch through the thick armor she wore. Tsavorite dashed away from her companion, slashing at the huge gem’s ankle in an attempt to foul her balance, but every strike that didn’t bounce off the armor seemed to sink in without slicing, as if attacking thick mud. As Tsavorite attacked with another flurry of swipes, a colossal mallet connected with her side and flung her across the room, sliding to the edge of one of the bubbling pools. A caustic smell assaulted her nostrils-- acid.

“Tsavorite!” shouted Star Sapphire in alarm. She floated upwards, arcing towards her friend, but was caught in midair by the giant, whose hand nearly swallowed the entire blue gem.

“You worthless clod,” grunted the garnet, rising back to her feet. “Let her go!”

“You’re ignoring a truth you do not want to admit,” said the giant, “You have failed at your purpose. You are defective.”

Anger flooded Tsavorite’s gem at the accusation. “Hold your tongue, you  _ off-color lowlife!” _ She channeled as much speed and strength as she could, and threw herself at Lead Bismuth without restraint. Every attack produced no effect. With a swat of her free hand, the giant slapped Tsavorite through the thin walls of the exhaust tower, a slow arc that sent her crashing to the floor again.

“Your diamonds built their empire on one law. Theirs. Those who obey become cogs in their machine. Those who reject that order are destroyed,” said Lead Bismuth, crossing between the acid pools. Star Sapphire struggled in her grip to no avail. “Considering an alternative is a crime. So the homogeneity continues.”

Tsavorite winced as she rose. Her physical form was losing stability again. This monster of a gem was simply in another league. “As it should,” she stated. “It serves to mirror the perfection the Diamonds embody.”

“If the diamonds are perfect, why do gems grow weary of their work and abandon their purposes, when those were ordained to them by the diamonds?” Lead Bismuth lurched forwards, swinging a fist that became a wrecking ball as it raced towards Tsavorite. The garnet split her Twinblades and crossed them to blunt the impact, but the weapons shattered against the titanic force of the collision, which embedded her in the far side of the dome.

The huge gem continued her verbal attack. “If the diamonds are perfect, why do their kindergartens produce overcooked and off-color gems? Why do their palaces crumble at the foundations? And why did Pink Diamond give us this planet and that space station?”

Tsavorite fell from her crater in the wall back onto the floor. She knew the enemy gem was wrong, but her body was in so much pain that she could not find an opposing argument. There had to be one, something that she could say, a razor that would cut through the vile lies. But she couldn’t find it. It wasn’t stored away in the lessons she had learned from her years in the field or in the court of the Diamonds. Of all gems, she should know how to respond, how to instantly destroy the case put before her, as she had done to uncountable rebel gems before. But no spark of insight caught. 

The enemy gem knelt down in front of the limp Tsavorite, doing little to change the gap in height between them.

“You understand what I am saying, yes? There is no such thing as perfection. The diamonds flaws will destroy them, and the entire Empire, if no one stops them. That is why we must destroy them first.”

Lead Bismuth scooped up the defeated garnet, clamping her hand down around both her and the sapphire. “In order for our new order to correct the course of the diamonds, the old ways must be purged. For you, it is the weight of your hypocrisy that demands retribution. But you know this now, yes?” 

Star Sapphire bit down on the mass of gray flesh that surrounded her, but her attack did not even elicit a grunt of displeasure from the giant bismuth. “No, no, no no no! Tsavorite, come on, wake up! We can’t get shattered here!”

The Galaxy Gem stomped back towards the pools of acid, and extended her hand above the bubbling surface.

“I can’t… do anything,” said Tsavorite weakly. “If I do… I have to admit that… that everything was wrong,” Her physical form flickered, its resolution growing fuzzy at the edges.

“So, what, you can’t admit that you were wrong?!” shouted Star Sapphire.

“If I do, I lose everything I believed in… I would have no purpose,” Tsavorite realized.

“Not everything!” Star Sapphire countered, continuing to struggle in vain. “You-- you’d still have me, right? And I’d still have you!”

Tsavorite’s eyes widened. “You’re right,” she said. “And maybe that wouldn’t be so bad.”

“Farewell,” said Lead Bismuth, plunging her hand into the acid. 

Even as her body was destroyed by the acid, Tsavorite felt a new sense of peace. Star Sapphire had always been there to help her, and here she was at the end. Even if everything else was gone, they could be together. It was a comforting thought, one that filled her gem with a new but welcome sensation of peace and warmth. In fact, the emotion seemed to boil out of her gem itself, and it melted her physical form into liquid light, running together with Star Sapphire and twisting in on itself. She felt something else, too, some voice, distant and getting closer, saying something she had always wanted to hear, but it receded quickly, and suddenly, the pain did as well. Tsavorite was looking up at the ceiling of the dome.

“What… was that?” asked Star Sapphire. Tsavorite turned her head to find the blue gem lying on the ground next to her, looking none the worse for wear. Tsavorite examined herself as well, finding her form to be completely unharmed.

“I don’t know,” Tsavorite exclaimed. 

“Impossible,” gasped Lead Bismuth, who Tsavorite realized was on the other side of the acid pools-- meaning they had somehow flown backwards out of the liquid. “No, it can’t be.”

“That’s right,” said Tsavorite, rising back to her feet. “We’re not done yet.”

“Yeah,” chirped Star Sapphire, following suit. “Oh, my gosh, you’re about to say something--”

“Maybe the diamonds aren’t perfect,” said Tsavorite defiantly. “And I know I am not. But your plan is far from perfection, too! I don’t know how you plan on doing it, but if you wipe out Homeworld, you’ll be destroying just as many innocent gems as the diamonds! How much better can your rule be, if it’s built on the same mistakes? If I ever want my conscience to be clean,” she continued, solemn and stoic as she summoned her twinblade, “then I cannot let this continue.”

Star Sapphire simply made an ecstatic gurgling sound.

“Star Sapphire, are you all right?” asked Tsavorite with genuine concern. 

The blue gem summoned her blaster and cracked a grin beneath a deep blue blush. 

“Better than ever!”

“Then let’s do this. Together!”

The gems exchanged a nod and split up, moving to flank Lead Bismuth.

“Aim for her face,” Tsavorite commanded as she split her twinblade.

“You’ve got it,” replied Star Sapphire, floating to get a better angle. She fired and raked the bismuth’s left eye. As before, her physical form seemed to diffuse much of the blast, but all the same, she reached up to her face in discomfort, and stumbled backwards.

“That’s it,” Tsavorite shouted triumphantly. “Just keep that up!” The garnet rocketed forth at full speed, again releasing a savage flurry of attacks across the giant’s body. But this time, her goal was not to damage her opponent. With her immense power and precision, Tsavorite directed every swipe and slash at the buckles holding Lead Bismuth’s armor in place. One by one, each plate fell away to the floor with a crash. The sudden shift in weight caused the huge gem to stumble forwards, catching herself with her hands.

“Oh, want some more?!” cackled Star Sapphire, blasting the bismuth in the face again and again.

After working through a complex series of buckles and latches, Tsavorite cut free the last strap holding the behemoth’s breastplate in place before propelling herself upwards. The massive cuirass smashed into the floor, cracking the stone where it fell. Underneath, it revealed a twinkling, iridescent cuboid gem.

“Your physical body can resist the acid,” Tsavorite said, landing against the curved ceiling. She hurled her twinblades downwards, piercing through Lead Bismuth’s hands and pinning them to the floor. “But your gem can’t!” Tsavorite pushed off the ceiling, combining her acceleration with gravity into a meteoric flying kick. The huge gem skidded forwards, her chest sliding towards the pool of acid.

“No, no--” the bismuth protested, attempting to push herself further away from the bubbling pit, but failing with her hands immobilized.

Tsavorite landed opposite of the giant’s face, and firmly grasped a lock of her iridescent hair. 

“You’ll tell us exactly where the warp pad is, or we’ll melt you into sludge,” said the garnet.

“My gem’s all aflutter,” Star Sapphire whispered.

“Even if you destroy me, Trapiche will see this through. This will never be over!” roared Lead Bismuth.

Tsavorite pulled the gem forwards by her hair, yanking her chest into the pool of acid. The bismuth screamed in pain as her form began to stutter and shift. Tsavorite lifted up, removing her gem from the caustic solution. 

“Aa-aaargh,” Lead Bismuth groaned. “It’s… It’s at the photovoltaic farm… that’s three hundred clicks from here, to the west! It’s-- it’s in an open plain that gives way to an ocean!”

Tsavorite de-summoned her twinblades, and knocked the wounded giant away from the acid with a swift roundhouse kick. 

“Thank you for your cooperation,” she said smugly. 

“Three hundred clicks is a long way without a ship,” Star Sapphire noted.

“Then we need to move  _ now _ ,” replied the garnet, grabbing the smaller blue gem by her outfit. She coiled down and leaped upwards, flinging them into the nearest smokestack. Tsavorite held Star Sapphire close as she used her free hand to smash through grates and filters as she ascended, bouncing from wall to wall inside the tower as she ascended, until the two burst forth from the top of the structure.

“If we had more time, I’d ask if we could do that again,” giggled a dizzy Star Sapphire.

“It’ll have to wait. There’s a warp pad with our name on it out there.”

“Let’s get off this crummy planet,” the blue gem sighed.

Tsavorite nodded, before jumping into the air once more, the second facility disappearing behind them as they charged towards their goal.


	5. The Little Green Valley

The planet’s crumminess began to change as the gems made their way west. Rocky desert became arid scrubland, which eventually became rolling prairie, filled with tiny verdant spines. Tsavorite had carried Star Sapphire along to keep their pace up, but as they entered a pleasant meadow split by a little tributary stream, she slowed to a halt.

“What’s wrong?” asked Star Sapphire, floating to ease the garnet’s burden.

Tsavorite sat down in a patch of purple flowers. “I’m not sure how long I can do this,” she sighed.

“Running?” Star Sapphire asked, taking a seat across from her. “Or everything else?”

“Everything else,” said Tsavorite. “I… I’m not sure how I feel. I have been cleaning up everything the Diamonds have made for as long as I can remember. That was my purpose. I poured every ounce of my energy into doing my job perfectly. That was everything I saw and understood. Once this is over-- however it ends, what… what am I going to do then?”

Star Sapphire picked one of the purple flowers and turned it in her hands, admiring the geometric leaves. “Well, what do you want to do?”

“I don’t know,” Tsavorite said. “How am I supposed to know? I’ve only ever done what I was assigned to do.”

“Well, you can take as much time as you need to figure that out. But if you want to start thinking about it, what were the things you enjoyed from doing your job?”

The garnet sat still, closing her eyes in thought. “...I liked travelling to new places. I liked the  _ Dark Matter _ .”

“There you go,” said Star Sapphire, plucking a petal from the flower. “Keep it up.”

“I liked the feeling I got when I told myself I was making the world a better place. What we’re doing here-- I don’t feel any guilt from it. It feels right.” Tsavorite continued.

“That’s good. What else?”

“I was made for fighting, and it comes naturally to me. I’m strong, and I want to use that strength for something good. To protect other gems. To protect… you,” Tsavorite said, looking back at her companion. Star Sapphire froze, having picked the last petal from the flower.

“Unless you don’t want me to,” Tsavorite doubled back, attempting to read the other gem’s response.

Star Sapphire let go of the flower, and the thin, spine-like plant drifted away in the breeze. She leaned forwards, towards the garnet, and almost placed a hand on her folded knee.

“I… think I need to tell you,” the blue gem began. “Because I don’t think you understood before. I’ve worked with you for a long time, and… during that time, I’ve been watching you.”

Tsavorite blinked. “I know that. You have precognitive abilities.”

“No, I mean, watching you. With my eye. I’ve seen you go on missions and talk down rebels, and I’ve seen you jump from exploding buildings into danger, and I’ve heard every steely speech you’ve given,” Star Sapphire said, finally finding her words. Her cheeks filled with a dark blue blush as she inched herself closer to the garnet.

“I’ve watched how you can blend right in with any court and how nothing scares you. And all of those things… they’re what I can’t do. When I see those things, it’s strange, this feeling I feel. I wish… I wish I could  _ be _ you. It sounds crazy, and, I mean, I know I can’t  _ be _ you. But I want to be as close to you as I can get. To be surrounded by you. Completely.”

Tsavorite simply looked at her companion, silent.

“I know that doesn’t make any sense,” Star Sapphire said, feeling as though she had walked into a dangerous mission herself. “I know I must sound like I’m defective. I must be defective, that’s it. A sapphire isn’t supposed to do this, we’re just supposed to see the future. But I can’t even look into a future about you and I. I’m… I’m too scared to see what it is.”

Behind her stoic expression, Tsavorite was doing what she always had: observing. Star Sapphire was right in her assumption that her fixation with her garnet sounded strange. Tsavorite could not quite process what she meant, or what that would even feel like. She was also correct that she sounded defective. Tsavorite had spent a long time hearing defective gems plead their cases. All of them yearned for things not allowed for them-- less work, more freedom, a different purpose, a command above their place. This was not dissimilar, and Tsavorite understood that if their current situation were only slightly different, Star Sapphire would be brought to justice as Tsavorite had done to so many gems before. That was a strategic-level observation. But battles are not simply won through strategic planning, but also battlefield tactics, and tactically Star Sapphire presented a different scenario. She was trembling. Tears were running down her face. She had just exposed information that, according to the Great Diamond Authority, was punishable by forcible rejuvenation-- meaning she had backed herself into a corner. Star Sapphire was  _ vulnerable _ . There was much that Tsavorite was uncertain of in her current situation, but she had come to a conclusion just moments before. She was strong. She wanted to protect vulnerable gems. And so, she leaned forward in kind, and surrounded Star Sapphire with her arms. She had seen the diamonds perform a similar gesture, an embrace. She gently tightened her grip around the smaller gem, taking care not to hurt her.

“I’m here,” said Tsavorite, calming the stunned Star Sapphire. “And I want to always be here. Close to you.”

“Tsavorite…” whispered Star Sapphire, sniffling. “T-thank you. Thank you.”

“If you want to go on adventures,” said Tsavorite, “then that’s what I want to do. But I think I was wrong.”

Star Sapphire broke away, moving out of the embrace but entwining her fingers with Tsavorite’s, terrified of losing the connection they were sharing, of ending the moment she had never thought possible.

“What… what do you mean?”

“I think,” said the garnet, a tear of her own welling in her right eye, “That adventures can have clear goals too.”

Star Sapphire leaned forwards, just as Tsavorite did likewise. They stopped for a moment, as a sudden warmth overflowed their gems. Their fingers turned into formless light as they folded together and ceased to be.

* * *

The atmosphere was thin, so the blue sky above was filled with stars. A gentle breeze rushed through the small plants surrounding her and over her body, and she thought for a moment that she had never felt something quite like it before. She sat up, and realized that she had never sat up before. Everything was new, for some reason.

“Why… do I feel like this?” she asked, realizing that her voice was new. She remembered everything she was seeing, she had just been there; yet it  _ looked _ different. She blinked, and realized that she had a new eye, one she was certain she had before. She looked down at her hands, and discovered one more than she remembered, yet it was familiar as well. She stood up and lost her balance, but caught herself with a grace that she knew she had but had never felt before. Gently, slowly, she placed one foot in front of the other, and found her way towards the little stream. She saw someone looking back at her in the water, and she knew it was Tsavorite, and she knew it was Star Sapphire, and she knew it was her, and she knew it was herself.

“We… fused,” she said, touching her new face as her reflection followed suit. Her skin had turned a vibrant green-blue, glossier and brighter than any color she could remember being. She thought she knew a word for the hue that felt right. “We’re… I’m… Turquoise.”

Her three eyes blinked in parallel, and she leaned over the water. The breeze caught her poncho, lifting it to reveal her two left arms. A part of her froze in terror. It was aberrant, and wrong. Not how a gem was supposed to be formed. And yet, both arms moved to her will. Every finger curled and uncurled as she watched. They didn’t feel wrong. They felt  _ more. _ She stood back up and could tell that she was taller than she had ever been, but this too was unsettling her less and less.

Her uniform had changed, warped in color and design. Much of it had torn and shifted, a dazzling pattern of blue and green and her own turquoise. On her left chest, a cachabon sapphire, with a glowing white asterism, like some kind of badge. On her left hip, a faceted garnet, a clear pale green. She took her own breath away. In fact, she was feeling overwhelmed with herself. Turquoise tumbled backwards and split in half, ejecting Tsavorite and Star Sapphire onto the meadow once more.

Star Sapphire patted herself down, feeling her reduced dimensions-- at first, she was almost disappointed. But she  _ had  _ to talk to someone, and Tsavorite was only a few steps away.

“Aaaaah!” she squealed with glee. “That-- that was incredible! H-how did we even do that?!”

Tsavorite stared into her own hands in awe. To feel herself become something different was disorienting. She wanted to say  _ sickening _ , but every moment had been a new discovery, a new wonder. She had felt a power she had never known before. But it had a cost. 

“You know what this means,” said the garnet slowly, gravely.

“W-what?” asked Star Sapphire.

“We can’t go back to the way things were before. Just like that… we destroyed everything.”

“What do you mean?”

Tsavorite knelt to look Star Sapphire in the eye.

“You know that what we just… became is an affront to the diamonds. It goes against everything their empire stands for. But we can’t return and pretend it never happened. Star Sapphire, I don’t want to pretend it never happened! I… we couldn’t hide something like this forever.”

“You’re right,” Star Sapphire said. “I want to do the opposite of hide this. I want to scream. What should we do?”

“I don’t know,” said Tsavorite. “But… when we were together, I wasn’t afraid. So let’s not be afraid!” She offered a hand to her companion. “We’ll find our answer. Together.”

Star Sapphire smiled and took Tsavorite’s hand. “I knew you would say that.”

In a flash of light, Turquoise returned. She waved a hand over her face and summoned a visor she had never summoned before, extending its bill into a wide brim to block the starlight from her sharpened triple eyes. She was going to figure everything out. She knew she would. She was going to look the future dead in the eye, and take it by the reins. Under these stars, she was going to find her own destiny. She was a new adventure, and she began by taking a step westward.


	6. The Master's Call

Below her, the sky met the sea, a final peninsula thrusting out into the endless ocean. Waves broke against the cliffs far below, creating a fine mist that rose to frame the jagged shape atop that last stretch of land. It was in the form of a colossal flower, easily the size of a warship, its petals patterned with the telltale grid of solar panels. It glittered in the light of all the stars above, individual panels rotating to track the brightest among them. And in its shadow, at the very edge of the continent, the blue crystal of a warp pad. Turquoise had made it.

“I’ve just got to get to that warp pad,” she said to herself, “And then, I’ve got to stop the Galaxy Gems on the station. We can… I can do it, I  _ can _ do it.” 

She repeated the words, attempting to instill confidence in herself. Her odds were slim. A battalion of blaster-armed rubies could be waiting on the other side of the warp pad, and that could be the end of it all. But she had no other choice. If she couldn’t, the future Tsavorite and Star Sapphire had created together would be destroyed. There would be no one left to protect. 

“No, I  _ have _ to do it,” she said, balling all three of her fists in determination. Turquoise stared down the path ahead and opened her mind to the future. The peninsula ahead wavered and shifted, first catching fire under a hail of energy blasts, then crumbling under the force of a tidal wave. A dark figure cast away a cloak. Turquoise gasped at the chaos of the image. When Star Sapphire looked into the future, it was clear, but limited in perspective. But this precognition was different, an out-of-body experience. She didn’t understand what everything was, but it was clear that the Galaxy Gems weren’t going to let her get to the warp pad easily.

A distant hum alerted her to their approach. Turquoise turned and watched three dropships crest a high ridge behind her. They floated towards her, deploying blaster turrets from their ventral surface. The weapons turned to track Turquoise as the ships moved into a hover above.

“I reckon you aren’t here to say howdy,” Turquoise chuckled. The words, however strange they sounded, felt right on her voice.

“This planet belongs to the Galaxy Gems,” echoed a tinny voice over the lead dropship’s loudspeaker. “Whoever you are, you’re a trespasser here!”

“I’m not looking for trouble, just passing through,” said the fusion as her poncho drifted in the wind.

“You’re about to  _ get _ passed through,” barked the voice from the loudspeaker. “Open fire!”

The turrets sprung to life, pelting the ground with blaster bolts. The plant life was scorched into ash instantaneously, but Turquoise was safely overhead, having foreseen the moment the weapons would fire. “You’re fast, but I’m faster,” she said, landing on one of the dropships. She had traversed a large portion of the planet on foot, but this was an opportunity to test just how her abilities translated into battle. She reached down her left hip to Tsavorite’s gem and focused on the garnet’s memories and skills. Her twinblade appeared in her left hand, and grabbing it with all three hands, she thrust the blade into the dropship’s roof. The blade split the spacecraft’s armor easily, and with little effort, Turquoise had cut an entrance for herself. A circular chunk of hull fell into the cabin of the dropship, and she followed it in. Blaster shots lit up the dark interior, but Turquoise outmaneuvered every shot.

“What… what is that thing?” gasped a ruby, terrified.

“She’s a fusion,” said the nephrite commander, activating the autopilot as the rest of the crew scrambled to get Turquoise in their sights. The nephrite swung out of her chair and summoned an off-white club into her hand. “But she’ll pop like anyone.”

A second hail of blaster fire tore through the cabin, but it hardly fazed Turquoise. It was incredible-- she could see every possible trajectory for every shot they could take, her future vision projecting them onto the present as a ghostly image. All she had to do was use her speed to stay in the places where no shots were, or  _ would _ be. And that was just as simple. She ducked and twisted and jumped and juked through the small interior of the spacecraft as if the crew were in slow motion, poofing each of the Galaxy gems in rapid succession. The nephrite only managed to raise her club into the air before the blue-green blur coalesced in front of her. Turquoise’s precognition told her that the nephrite was about to invent a novel profanity to describe her current situation, but decided to cut her short, and sliced her in half with her twinblade. The dropship lurched to the side as warnings lit up the control panel. Out the windows, Turquoise could see that the other dropships had opened fire on their ally. 

“Not the neighborly sort, are they,” she grunted, leaping out of her makeshift entryway as a blaster bolt set off a chain reaction in the wounded dropship’s engine. The circular vessel flipped upside-down and detonated, the resulting shrapnel tearing into the closer of its two wingmates, which lost control and splashed down in the raging sea. Turquoise simply observed the events unfold as she hovered in mid-air. The final dropship was not so complacent, turning aggressively to bring the fusion into the firing arc of its turret. 

“Look, partner, you’re bringing this on yourself,” said Turquoise, shrugging with all three shoulders. The dropship did not heed the warning, and charged directly at her with its turret blazing. She gripped her twinblade with both of her left hands and spun the weapon with all of her new speed. The blades became a blur of metal, a shield that diffused every blaster shot. As the dropship increased speed in an attempt to ram her, Turquoise simply turned the spinning blades sideways, and buzzsawed the vessel in half. As the halves of the bisected dropship raced past, Turquoise reached to Star Sapphire’s gem and drew her own blaster. With her future vision directing her aim, she poofed every member of the free-falling crew before they hit the ground.

Turquoise landed in the wreckage, observing her work.

“Hoo-eey, that was incredible,” she laughed. “Those rebels don’t even know what hit ‘em.”

She returned her focus to the warp pad, and proceeded down the peninsula. She stopped when her future vision warned of the ground beneath her feet being swept away. The tidal wave. She floated off the ground as a precaution, but a glance out at the ocean revealed no rogue wave incoming. However, a glint of light did attract her attention upwards. One of the stars in the sky was moving, and fast. Its faint white light turned a fiery red as it hit the atmosphere, and a bank of distant clouds parted as the shockwave of its approach neared the surface of the ocean.

“What in tarnation,” whispered Turquoise, who brought her arms up to cover her face as her precognition warned her of the incoming shockwave. Through the gap between her left arms, she watched the sea open up, parting around the new arrival. A wall of force smashed into Turquoise, throwing her to the ground as the sound of the impact cracked through the sky. She staggered to her feet in time to watch the wave swell towards her. Quickly, she planted her twinblade in the soil and hunkered down. The water smashed into the land, snapping the photovoltaics plant off of its mechanical stem and crushing it into debris. It punched a gap into the narrowest part of the peninsula, turning its furthest point into an island. It ripped every plant from the surface of the ground, and it carried the crashed dropships away as if they were toys. Turquoise winced as she pulled herself back to her feet. Her physical form flickered, worn down by the ocean’s assault. She looked back down her path to see the frothing sea separating her from the warp pad. Ahead of her, the water again began to fluctuate. A tall spray rose from the surface as something emerged from the point of impact, making a beeline for Turquoise. She readied herself for whatever was approaching. Her third eye tracked the object’s approach, and calculated its flight path through a thousand possible futures. With pinpoint accuracy, she raised her blaster and fired, the shot lancing straight for her target. At the point of impact, the bolt of energy bounced away. 

“Well, shoot,” Turquoise sighed. Whatever it was reached her in another instant, and hit her in the stomach. 

* * *

Tsavorite felt sand beneath her. At first she was confused as to why she felt sand, but her confusion turned to terror when she realized that  _ she _ was feeling it. She pushed herself up, her physical form deteriorating to nearly nothing before she regained her concentration. She was on a beach, and in front of her was a long trail in the sand, dug by something moving very quickly. A matching one ran parallel to hers, and nestled at its end was a thin blue gem.

“Star Sapphire!” Tsavorite shouted, stumbling over to her fallen friend. Weakly, Star Sapphire’s eye opened.

“Get ready,” she whispered ominously. “She’s coming.”

“Who is--” Tsavorite began to ask, when a droplet of water fell onto the back of her hand. It was followed by another, and in moments a driving rain enveloped the gems. Tsavorite looked up, but the sky was clear. The only thing in it was the large gem descending towards them, mist trailing from her body. The shower stopped as she landed, having simply been sea spray she had carried on her flight across the planet. Her battle mask folded up along her cheeks to expose her scowl as her four eyes focused on Tsavorite and Star Sapphire. Steam rose from her body, coiling off of her Galaxy Gem insignia in lazy ribbons. She was a brilliant white, with blue and yellow-green accents spreading outwards from her torso. In the center of her waist was a blue teardrop of a gem, and set in her forehead was a green triangle. Her second pair of arms were folded behind her shoulders, shape-shifted into a strange, thruster-like assembly.

“A fusion,” Tsavorite whispered. 

“How could you,” she said, her voice soft and deep. Tsavorite felt the water around her body begin to move, and soon she was pulled along with it, racing off the ground towards the Galaxy Gem. She stopped a few feet in front of the fusion, whose four eyes met Tsavorite’s two with a look of burning hatred. Tsavorite attempted to move, but the water seemed to have solidified around her, locking her limbs together. “How could you?” the fusion repeated.

“I don’t know what you--” Tsavorite attempted to protest, but the water surrounding her body flew backwards, throwing her into the sand again. 

“When Trapiche told me that you two had fused, I wanted to believe you could change, that you could see the madness of what you were doing. But here you are, using what you have to destroy yourselves! To destroy _me!_ To destroy everyone that could be _like_ _us!_ How could you betray us like that?”

“You’re insane,” said the garnet, crawling back towards Star Sapphire.

“I am Pallasite,” the fusion replied, waving her hand towards Tsavorite and Star Sapphire. Water vapor coalesced around her into sharpened rhomboids, which rocketed into the sand in front of Tsavorite before becoming liquid once more. “I was given life through the love between a Lapis Lazuli and a Peridot seven hundred and ninety-six years ago, and every day I have lived with the pain of being forbidden! Those gems promised each other that they would fight for a world where I could exist freely. With the Galaxy Gems, I can make that happen.”

“We won’t let you!” cried Star Sapphire, propping herself up on an elbow and drawing her blaster. She fired at Pallasite, who conjured a lens of water that diffused the energy, the blast ricocheting away into the ocean. The fusion sighed.

“I know you won’t,” she said. A tendril of water formed from the ocean behind her, taking the form of a curved two-handed sword. Her smaller, folded arms lifted upwards as gigantic, crystalline wings of water formed behind her back. “We’re at an impasse. There’s only one way this can end.”

Tsavorite scrambled up and dashed for Star Sapphire, narrowly moving her clear before Pallasite burst forward, cutting a vertical gash clear through the cliff face behind them. 

“All the precision of a technician, and the strength to level worlds,” Tsavorite said, looking over her shoulder as she desperately sprinted down the beach. 

“She’s too strong for us,” murmured Star Sapphire. “She’s too strong for Turquoise.”

“I know,” huffed Tsavorite, spotting the broken peninsula in the distance. Pallasite was a new level of threat-- perhaps as strong as a Diamond. She wondered if the length of their fusion had increased her power further. A few hours as Turquoise and they had downed flights of dropships-- this Pallasite had hundreds of years to learn the extent of her powers.

“How are we going to beat her?” said Star Sapphire, trembling. Tsavorite dodged a burst of water blades, putting every ounce of strength she had left into running.

“We’re not going to beat her,” Tsavorite said, a strategy beginning to form. “All we need to do is stay alive and stay talking.”

“Then what are we waiting for? Let’s do it,” Star Sapphire smiled. Tsavorite dropped to dodge another wave of razor-thin water, throwing up a screen of sand. Pallasite floated forwards cautiously, her nodachi at her side. A storm of blaster fire emerged from the sand, and Pallasite quickly deflected the attacks with her sword. The sand settled to reveal Turquoise, who spun her blaster in her right hand. She gave a confident grin, even as her physical form wavered.

“All right, buster. If you want to do this the hard way, we’ll do this the hard way.”

Pallasite gritted her teeth and crouched down before blasting towards them, the ocean behind her splitting as she took off. She collided with Turquoise after breaking the sound barrier, carrying her upwards into the sky. Turquoise watched the ground retreat below her, as Pallasite suddenly stopped her ascent and threw her upwards.

“If you stop us, how much longer will we suffer?” Pallasite screamed, summoning hundreds of shards of water. “How much longer will we be persecuted?!”

The water blades shot upwards, all converging on Turquoise. She rolled and sidestepped and dove in place, dodging as many of them as she could, but a few still raked her body, causing it to flicker rapidly. 

“I don’t know!” Turquoise shouted as she darted back downwards to her opponent, attempting to deliver a diving kick to her chest. Pallasite simply condensed one wing into the shape of a giant hand and swatted the younger fusion away. Turquoise tumbled down, falling towards the cliffs below. She used her levitation to guide herself onto the cliff top gently, but had to dive away to avoid the meteoric descent of Pallasite, whose blade split the entire cliff face in half. 

Pallasite swung around to face them, livid. Her cool demeanor had disappeared. “You don’t know, but you’re willing to fight for that suffering to continue?!”

“I only just discovered this,” Turquoise explained, dodging another slash from the Galaxy Gem. “I can’t pretend I know what you went through,” she continued. “But believe me, I don’t want anyone to suffer! That’s why I have to stop you.”

Unmoved, Pallasite wound up and swung a downward slash towards Turquoise, who quickly summoned her twinblades and crossed them to block the attack. The metal blades stopped the water sword, but the impact sent Turquoise to her knees, hard enough that the ground beneath her cratered instantly. The cliff began to crumble beneath them.

“What are you  _ talking about? _ ” Pallasite roared. “How is the status quo going to stop the pain that it creates?”

“Because we’re not alone!” Turquoise pleaded from the ground, feeling her body about to give out. She flickered and jittered in place, desperately using the strength she had left to keep herself together long enough to speak. “Until today, I didn’t know that you or I were even  _ possible _ ,” she explained. “And now I’ve met you. Ain’t that something? Two forbidden fusions in the same place at the same time. I reckon the chances of that are pretty slim if we’re the only ones like us in the universe.”

Pallasite stayed her blade, but she continued to tremble with anger. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, there  _ have _ to be others like us out there! We can’t be alone! And if your Galaxy Gems destroy everything Homeworld has ever made, then you’re destroying all the gems like us, who have hidden themselves away like you did! Now tell me, partner, who suffers then?”

Pallasite opened her mouth to speak, but the cliff gave way, sending both fusions tumbling down with the rubble onto the beach. Turquoise cried out as a chunk of stone fell onto her leg, pinning her. Pallasite turned her sword on the falling rocks, turning them into gravel before they had a chance to hurt her. She floated to the fallen Turquoise. 

“I think I understand,” she said. “I understand that you’re the problem.”

“Ain’t exactly what I was goin’ for,” Turquoise lamented.

“Even if I assume that you’re right, and there are others like us hiding throughout Homeworld space, you’re saying I should give up my own safety, and they should give up theirs, for the lives of everyone else. For everyone who is  _ normal _ . Let me give you a counter-offer,” she said, raising a hand towards the sky. “I say, everyone who lives in the diamonds’ favor has had enough time in peace. And you’ve had enough time pretending to be like  _ me. _ If there are others who have to hide themselves away, I’ll be doing them a favor by ending their suffering. If it’s any consolation, you won’t suffer long either.” She swung her outstretched arm downwards. A single star above began to move.

“What did you just do?” asked Turquoise, already seeing visions of planetary devastation.

“I just pulled a magnetic asteroid out of its orbit, just like what I did to your ship,” Pallasite explained. It should be here in about thirty seconds. It’ll vaporize you and the warp pad. And perhaps the other gems on the planet as well, but they knew that our cause was a dangerous one.”

“You can’t do this,” grunted Turquoise, struggling against the boulder. The star had already begun glowing red above. A roaring sound like an enormous fire could be heard as it broke through the atmosphere. 

Pallasite rolled all four of her eyes. “Please. Do you really think I’m going to listen to you?”

“Maybe you can listen to me,” said a voice from further down the beach. The two fusions turned, and Turquoise was only half-shocked to see the hooded figure from before. Her vision had predicted their arrival, but she didn’t expect it to happen like this.

“And who are  _ you _ exactly?” asked Pallasite.

The figure reached up and tossed aside their cloak. Turquoise defused in shock. Pallasite froze. The wind raced as the sky itself was torn apart by the oncoming meteor.

“I’m the only one who can fix this,” said Pink Diamond, extending her hands to her sides. The beach was surrounded in a garish pink glow as interlocking hexagons erupted from the planet’s surface, at first forming walls, and then a roof above them. The last segments of the colossal shield closed together, and the asteroid made contact. The ground shifted beneath them, and the ocean rose out of its own banks before crashing back down over them. Dust and dirt swirled outside the transparent pink walls as smoking debris rained into the sand and sea. Pink Diamond winced with effort, but the barrier held steady.

“Goodness gracious,” Turquoise exclaimed.

Pallasite fell onto her hands and knees.

“It’s over, then,” she whimpered, tears welling in her eyes. “Just go ahead and shatter me. I give up. I don’t want to live in a world like this anymore.”

Pink Diamond collapsed the barrier, the threat averted. She knelt down next to Pallasite. “I want to know more about you.”

“W-what?” asked the fusion.

“I’ve never seen anyone like you,” Pink Diamond explained. “Tell me more about yourself. I want to understand.”

“Really?”

“Of course,” said Pink Diamond, leaning back to listen. 

“Well,” Pallasite started. “Seven hundred and ninety-six years ago, a Lapis Lazuli gaaaaaarrggh,” she wailed as a twinblade was drawn across her midsection. She poofed, exposing Turquoise, who had managed to pry the boulder off her leg.

“Don’t just sit there, bubble her!” she ordered.

“Oh, uh, yeah,” stammered Pink Diamond, quickly bubbling the rebel gems and teleporting them light-years away. “Thanks for bailing me out there. I don’t think I’m very good at talking people down from things.”

“Me neither,” said Turquoise. “Now--” she began, before her physical form finally gave out, splitting back into Tsavorite and Star Sapphire. 

“-- Just what do you think you’re doing here?!” the garnet exclaimed. Star Sapphire held her head in giddy dizziness.

“I knew White thought I couldn’t do this. That’s why she brought you to me in the first place. I wanted to prove her wrong,” Pink Diamond explained. “So I borrowed a ship of my own and followed you out here. But my spaceship crashed and I didn’t really know what I was doing, so I tried to stay close without you noticing.”

“You thought it would be a good idea to just hop on over and watch your own mutiny up close?” Tsavorite asked, bewildered.

“I also thought I might learn  _ why _ they did it, and I guess I can see that now,” she said, idly drawing a flower in the sand. “I had no idea so many gems were hurting because of the Diamonds. I thought it was just… me.”

“Look, Pink Diamond, I don’t know you that well,” Star Sapphire began. “But these Galaxy Gems aren’t just hurting-- they want to hurt others. They plan on destroying at least Homeworld. We can’t let that happen. Oh, did I just say something stoic?” she gasped. “I think I did. Oh, my gosh.”

“Star Sapphire is right. We can’t let that happen. But now we have to go straight to their station with the gem they likely want to shatter the most,” Tsavorite said. “But if you can use your powers up there like you did right here, we might have a chance.”

“I have to take responsibility for something,” Pink Diamond said, rising back to her feet. “I’m in.”

“All right. It’s hostile boarding action time!” said Star Sapphire.

“Let’s go,” said Tsavorite, starting back down the beach towards the destroyed peninsula. 

“Actually, before we go,” Pink Diamond interrupted. “Can we talk about  _ you guys fusing? _ ”

“Look, you can shatter us  _ after _ we save you,” Tsavorite sighed.

“No, no… I think it’s all right,” Pink explained. “I wish I could connect with someone like that. And you get a different voice with an accent and everything!”

“If you think it’s not a problem, why don’t you work to make things better for fusions? You’re a Diamond, after all. You can use your power to change things for the better,” Star Sapphire suggested. “They may be crazy, but these Galaxy Gems have real grievances. They’re acting out because they’re angry, like someone running in to do a job they were told not to do,” Star Sapphire said, looking back at Pink Diamond.

“Do you get really  _ wise _ when you fuse? If you do, that’s really cool,” said Pink Diamond, following behind them. “But you’re right. I can try to make a difference. When this is over, that will be my first priority.”

“Then our first order of business is getting this over with,” said Tsavorite, jumping from the beach below to the remaining cliff top. She looked down from the ledge at her companions. “Let’s go change Trapiche’s mind.”


	7. Big Iron

The three gems gathered around the warp pad, scrutinizing it closely as if it was some unknown insect.

“So, do you want to go first?” asked Pink Diamond, tapping her foot. “I don’t think I should go first.”

“I could go first, and try to clear a path,” Tsavorite offered.

“Or I could just use my future vision to tell you all what’s on the other side,” Star Sapphire suggested. The two larger gems exchanged glances.

“Or you could do that,” Pink Diamond said.

“It’s a great idea,” Tsavorite agreed.

Star Sapphire walked onto the warp pad and stood quietly for a moment. 

“It’s just a pearl.”

“Well, that’s not so bad,” Pink Diamond concluded.

“A normal pearl? Not off-color or a fusion or something?” asked Tsavorite.

“A normal pearl,” Star Sapphire clarified. 

“We’ll take what we can get. Up we go,” said the garnet, stepping onto the warp pad. Pink Diamond followed suit, and the three were hurtled off-world, arriving in a dimly-lit chamber. A green pearl bowed politely in front of the warp pad. 

“Welcome to the Galaxy Refractor,” she said. “Trapiche has been expecting you.”

“That’s a very nice welcome coming from people that want us dead,” Pink Diamond noted.

“Trapiche did say she was a good host,” Star Sapphire recalled. 

“I don’t know if I trust her definition of a good host,” Tsavorite countered, before gesturing to the pearl. “If you please?”

The pearl nodded and led them out of the chamber. The station’s architecture was as pink as its commissioner. Tsavorite couldn’t help but roll her eyes at the ornate flourishes of design-- inlaid patterns here, a fountain or two there. As the pearl continued onward, they entered an open area flanked with staircases-- a _foyer_ , the garnet realized. She expected nothing less from Pink Diamond, who was oddly quiet. 

“It’s a nice place you’ve got here,” Star Sapphire said to the diamond.

“A nice place _we’ve_ got here,” growled an agate leading a passing patrol of quartzes. 

“And the staff’s friendly, too,” the thin blue gem added. 

Above them, a viewing panel let in the ambient starlight. Massive mirror panels extended out into the void on thin struts. As the station rotated slowly, the light produced a kaleidoscope effect on the floor. The pearl cleared her throat as the gems paused to watch, and they quickly returned to their course. The pearl arrived at an open ballroom, hexagonal in shape. Monitors and displays flanked the edges of the room, attended by peridots, while a large stage occupied the center. The center of the stage had been engraved with the Great Diamond Authority insignia, but a fresh coat of paint covered the emblem with the swirling pattern of the Galaxy Gems’ own symbol. Above the stage, heavy machinery hung down, a series of tubes and lenses and cables winding together into a central spire. The glass ceiling revealed that the spire continued up out into space, surrounded on all sides by the huge mirror panels. With another bow, the pearl departed. On the other side of the room, a door opened, and the emerald entered. 

She towered above all gems in the room except Pink Diamond, who she only exceeded by a few inches. Her uniform was the ornate regalia of a commander, with bright crystalline armor over her limbs, but any patches indicating her loyalty to a diamond had been replaced with the Galaxy Gem spiral. Holding back her wild mane of jet-black hair was accented by simple metal tiara. Her hexagonal gem, green with a black star pattern, sat at the bottom of her neck, glowing faintly even in the well-lit room. She moved forwards onto the center of the stage, her eyes flashing with joy as she observed her guests. Her lips parted into a wide, fanged grin.

“Oh, ho ho, look at this,” she chuckled. “You’ve made it. And you’ve brought along a plus-one, isn’t that nice? Welcome back, Pink Diamond.”

Pink Diamond folded her arms in defiance. “Yes, I feel _very_ welcome,” she pouted.

“I would hope so. You’re a real guest of honor.” Trapiche spread her arms wide, bathing in the starlight. “None of this would be possible without you.”

“That’s enough gloating,” Tsavorite demanded. 

“Is it? No, I don’t think it’s hardly enough,” said the emerald with a wicked smile. “But if you insist, I’ll let you do the talking for a spell. You all made it here, and I am most impressed.”

“So, what’s your big plan?” asked Star Sapphire. “If you blow up Homeworld, what is there left for you?”

“I believe you Diamond friend can answer that for you,” Trapiche retorted. Tsavorite and Star Sapphire looked up at Pink Diamond.

“The… new galaxy,” she gasped.

“Precisely,” Trapiche confirmed. She raised a hand, and a hologram projection immediately sprung to life behind her. Pictured was a star map of a spiral galaxy not dissimilar from the ones in the rebel insignia. “I present to you the Milky Way. Only a few jumps away, and packed to the brim with the resources for new colony worlds. For the Diamonds, it’s a new set of coordinates to exploit. But for us, it’s the promised land. Billions of stars and millions of planets. Interstellar paradise, ours for the taking. Provided there’s no one left to take it from us. That’s why when you needed someone to command your laser light show, I jumped at the opportunity,” Trapiche smiled. “All it needed was a little reconfiguration to turn it into the largest laser light _cannon_ of all time. And from where we’re sitting, we’ve got enough range to vaporize Homeworld, and every colony world in the local cluster. In the blink of an eye, the Diamonds and their cruelty will become nothing but a distant memory.”

Tsavorite gritted her teeth in disgust. “How can you smile while plotting the death of billions of gems?” 

Trapiche’s grin did not waver. “It’s simple, really. Fossilization.”

“Fossilization?” Pink Diamond asked.

“I see you don’t spend much of your time in kindergartens,” the emerald oiled. “I expect nothing less from the Great Diamond Authority. I’ll put it in layman’s terms. Organic material is very frail compared to us gems. We have bodies made of silicon, theirs are made of carbon. Now, once that organic material is dead, and providing nothing destroys it, minerals seep into the structure of their bodies and harden, turning them to stone. Normally, organic life dies in a few short years, but after they fossilize, they become as eternal as gems. Fixed in time. Similarly, your so-called great empire has also fossilized. They cannot change. In their efforts to create a world in their image, the Diamonds have instead duplicated their shortcomings, until those flaws are all that exist. I’m not smiling at the death of billions of gems. They died a long time ago, all of their light, all of their potential, smothered. Nothing of value will be lost.”

“And you call the Diamonds cruel?!” shouted Pink Diamond. 

“Of course I do. Tell me, are my transgressions so different from theirs? Perhaps they have never wiped a galaxy clean in one fell swoop before, but they have done it by inches. How many life forms driven to extinction, across how many worlds? You hold me accountable for the lives of all of these gems, but how many have they put to death themselves? Let’s ask our garnet friend, she should know some of that number.”

Tsavorite grimaced. “You’re a monster.”

“I am a product of my surrounding strata, as all gems are,” Trapiche explained. “Emerald Facet-3 Cut-9GT, Ipsilon Kindergarten, Homeworld. When I emerged I turned the whole sector to glass. All of their readings on me were perfect. But when the dust settled, their tune changed. You see, I had an _inclusion._ ”

Trapiche seemed to relax, as bands of black material erupted from her skin, segmenting her perfect coloration. From the dark substance, long spikes took form, turning her elegant shape into something more sinister. Tsavorite felt a nagging sensation of disgust-- she just seemed _wrong_ to behold. But that made sense. She knew what an inclusion was.

“She’s off-color,” Star Sapphire said.

“No,” Tsavorite explained. “She’s not entirely Gem.”

“Semantics aside, off-color is what they called me,” Trapiche said, marching closer to her guests. “I was perfect except for a tiny speck, embedded deep inside my gem. But that was reason enough to throw me out. While I waited for the guards to arrive, I shattered the next emerald that emerged, and shapeshifted into her. You know, it takes an immense amount of strength for me to suppress my true form. And I’ve been exercising a _long_ time. Every day, as I lived my false life, I promised myself that I would find a solution to the backwardness that decided I was unfit for my purpose. For a while, I thought that you were that solution, Pink Diamond.”

Pink recoiled away as the twisted emerald gestured towards her.

“You weren’t like the others. In fact, I began to suspect that you were off-color yourself. I waited for thousands of years, kindling that spark of hope that you could set things right. That you could show them all how wrong you were. But that flame sputtered out long ago. You’re a fool and the other Diamonds know it. That’s why you’re never going to get your own colony. You’ve got no ambition beyond making crass and vulgar jokes. A spinel could do your job, and she’d do it better, too. The truth is you’re no diamond. You’re just a lump of coal.”

Tsavorite looked up at the Diamond, whose face wrinkled with fear and sorrow. Tears rolled down her cheeks. In that moment, she was just as pathetic as Trapiche had said, and just as pathetic as the garnet had always suspected she was. The emerald laughed at her distress, and that moment ended. 

In an instant, Trapiche was against the back wall of the ballroom, a dent caved into her right cheek. Pink Diamond stood on the stage where the emerald had been moments before, her extended fist encased in a small pink bubble. A rose-colored aura radiated from her skin, and her brow was furrowed in anger and determination.

Trapiche pried herself off of the wall, staggering forwards. As she rose, her expression of surprise turned to one of glee.

“So,” she said, beginning to chuckle. “That little lump has caught fire.”

“They’ve put me down as long as I can remember,” Pink roared. “I’m not going to let you do the same!”

“Good,” the Emerald smiled, licking her lips. “You’ve got some bite. Let’s see if you’re a monster like me.”

The two giants charged at each other, butting heads with enough force to create a shockwave. Armored slats emerged to cover the skylights as energy shields were projected around the banks of monitors and their attendant peridots. The door they had entered from opened, and Galaxy Gems swarmed into the room, surrounding Star Sapphire and Tsavorite.

“On the ground, now!” screamed a carnelian from behind her blaster. 

“After you,” smirked Tsavorite, exchanging a knowing glance with Star Sapphire as she took her companion’s hand. Turquoise formed in a flash.

“Blue blazes,” Turquoise exclaimed, scanning her surroundings. “This looks like a real barn-burner.”

“It’s the fusion,” called out a jasper, raising her blaster and taking a shot. Her finger had not yet left the trigger before Turquoise had maneuvered behind her and split her with the slash of a twinblade. 

“Y’all be careful now,” Turquoise said, drawing her own blaster. “You could hurt someone with one of these things.”

The Galaxy Gems attacked, a storm of blaster fire, blades, clubs, and whips. Turquoise weaved through the teeming masses, her precognition allowing her to dodge every attack that would destroy her physical form. She was her own storm, arms and legs moving at incomprehensible speeds, knocking away opponents, slicing gems apart, lining up shots, always moving, always accelerating. It was a rush like none she had felt before. The part of her that was once Tsavorite relished the challenge; the part of her that was Star Sapphire was euphoric in her own power. And they were united in a common purpose, to put an end to Trapiche’s madness. As she fought, she began to realize that she had become more than a sum of those parts. Tsavorite had strength but lacked her own drive, Star Sapphire could see a million futures she wanted but couldn’t have. Turquoise was everything they had wanted and then some. An explosion of passion, an avatar of justice. Wave after wave, the Galaxy Gems poured towards her, and she scattered them like dust. Slowly, the pitch of battle changed, the endless stream of rebel gems growing thinner and thinner. As they surrounded the fusion, they did not charge at once, but instead only a frenzied few among them leapt forward to be cut down. Eventually, the attacks stopped altogether. A wall of gems surrounded Turquoise, frozen. The fusion took a single step towards a huddling mass of them, and the gems turned and fled. She wheeled to face the rest, and the formation dissolved, scrambling from the ballroom. Turquoise allowed herself a moment to pause, feeling the limits of her enhanced endurance. Hundreds of formless gems surrounded her on the floor. Aside from some very nervous looking peridots hunkered down behind energy shields, only two other gems were left standing in the room. 

Pink Diamond swung for an uppercut with a bubble-shielded fist, but Trapiche stepped aside and raked her opponent with a series of sharp black spikes emerging from her arm. Pink Diamond stumbled backwards, and the emerald rushed in, spotting a vulnerability. The diamond deployed a larger hexagonal shield, which Turquoise recognized from the meteor attack. Trapiche collided with the wall, scraping her twisted spines against the barrier. When they failed to deal any damage, she instead traced her fingers over the lines dividing each segment of the shield. With her gem radiating a violent green glow, Trapiche pushed her fingers through, gripping the inside of the barrier.

“There you go again,” Trapiche snarled as she pulled, slowly separating the segments of the shield. “Hiding away from your problems!” With a primal grunt, the emerald ripped the shield apart and with one arm lifted Pink Diamond into the air by her face. Turquoise drove a flying kick into Trapiche’s side, staggering the emerald briefly, but her future vision warned of an impact she wouldn’t avoid. Trapiche’s free hand snapped down, closing around the fusion’s midsection.

“You’ve got spirit, I’ll give you that,” Trapiche said as she lifted Turquoise to eye level. “But you’ve put it all into a self-defeating mission. Your precognition hasn’t stopped you from being short-sighted.”

With a flick of her wrist Trapiche sent Turquoise flying back across the room, skidding through the piles of Galaxy Gems she had just poofed. The emerald then slammed Pink Diamond to the ground, head-first. The entire station seemed to reel from the impact. Trapiche wound her right arm back, as the spikes growing out of it curved forward into a wicked black blade. 

“I must admit, dealing with you personally has been a real treat. Just saying ‘fire’ and obliterating your fellow diamonds won’t give me the same sense of satisfaction that this will.” Trapiche’s arm fired forwards like a piston, the blade ready to split Pink Diamond’s gem in two. But an inch from its target, her arm-blade halted. A hexagonal shield had formed between the emerald and the diamond, the facets of its segments splitting Trapiche’s arm at the elbow. The bladed forearm tumbled to the ground uselessly as Trapiche stumbled backwards, holding her glowing stump. 

“All you had to do was pretend you were someone else,” said Pink Diamond softly, her body rigid as it levitated up from the floor. Turquoise pulled herself upright to watch the diamond’s unnatural movement. Her eyes were black voids pierced by a single glowing speck of light. Even Trapiche seemed shaken. “...and you could get away with all this. All while I can’t do anything.”

“You little--” Trapiche grunted, swinging her still-intact arm, only for it to bounce off of a briefly-visible barrier of rose-tinted light. 

“It’s not **_FAIR_ ** **,”** Pink Diamond screamed, emitting a wave that caused the interior lights to flicker and warning klaxons to sound. The peridots in their shielded cubicles clutched their heads in agony. Trapiche was knocked to the ground, and Turquoise nearly poofed against the ballroom’s wall. 

“They’ll never listen to me,” Pink Diamond continued, her aura glowing brighter and brighter. Turquoise quickly deployed her visor to filter out some of the light. “I’ll never have anything that I want.” Pink Diamond advanced on her fallen opponent, the floor of the station fracturing under each of her footfalls. “Like you said… fossilized,” she said, her voice an eerie monotone. 

Trapiche shuffled backwards along the floor, her movement unsteady with her missing arm. “Now, hold on--”

“Better to start everything in this universe over,” she said, looking up at the ceiling. “Maybe they’ll be nicer to me then.”

“You’ll destroy us all!” The emerald pleaded.

Pink Diamond looked downwards, her eyes devoid of all light except for the two blinding points. “Then I’m a monster, too.”

Crystalline shards began to erupt from the diamond, shredding her skin and uniform alike. Trapiche reached to her own gem and summoned a small, cylindrical shape. With a flick of her thumb the device expanded outwards, an energy sickle erupting from one end. The emerald threw herself forwards and raked the swelling form of Pink Diamond with the weapon. The growing mass of light warped and writhed, forming something horrifyingly large that howled like no gem should, before collapsing in on itself, every violent particle of light contained in an inert pink gem that clattered to the floor. Trapiche rose to her feet and slung the rejuvenator over her shoulder.

“Well,” she said, her eyes wide with disbelief. “I suppose that’s the future’s problem.” She returned her attention to Turquoise. “But you, I can deal with now. Move the time table up,” Trapiche commanded to the peridots still manning their controls. “We’ll open fire in five minutes. I should be done with our guests before then.” Trapiche grunted, and the light from her stump surged forward, forming a new forearm as black as her spikes.

Turquoise stood and advanced towards the off-color emerald. She didn’t know what exactly had just happened to Pink Diamond, but she knew what a rejuvenator was, and knew that the diamond would be out of commission for a while. She was the only one left who could stop this. Trapiche only smiled as she approached.

“Look, there’s no need for this hostility to continue. Put your weapons down, and you can join us in the new galaxy, live a life as free as you please. It’s something you won’t have if you win-- though that’s not likely.”

“I would rather die than let you commit a genocide,” the fusion said defiantly, readying a fighting stance.

“Shame,” said Trapiche, spinning the rejuvenator before holding it at the ready. “Then you’ll die, _and_ I’ll commit a genocide!”

Trapiche swung fast, but Turquoise was faster, the rejuvenator splitting through the air just above her as she ducked. The fusion darted beneath Trapiche and flanked her, firing her blaster into the emerald’s back. The shot punched a hole clear through her, but as Trapiche turned to face Turquoise again the wound was already sealing shut.

“It’s going to take a lot more than that to poof me,” she cackled. Turquoise rushed back in, separating her twinblades. She dashed over another slash of the rejuvenator and swung with both weapons, which Trapiche caught with the black spikes on her forearms. The growths seemed completely immune to the blades, and with a short, brutal movement, the emerald pulled back and yanked the swords from the fusion’s hands before kicking her away. Turquoise tumbled across the ground, only rising in time to dodge another assault from Trapiche’s rejuvenator. The floor of the station shifted, and energy began to flow through the tubes circling the room’s central spire.

“I can’t get close,” the fusion whispered to herself. “And I don’t have enough firepower to destabilize her physical form…”

Trapiche performed another flourish with her rejuvenator, beckoning the fusion to rush in. 

“Just give up,” she called. “You can’t always save the day.”

Tsavorite and Star Sapphire didn’t have an answer, but Turquoise did.

“No,” Turquoise replied, summoning a replacement set of twinblades. “I _will_ find a way.” She slammed her weapons together, which melted into white-hot molten light. Even Trapiche had to shield her eyes. Turquoise could see a solution, to Trapiche, to her plan, to all of it. The weapon that was taking shape in her hands represented that answer, distilled into physical form. The light faded, and in her left hands was a blaster, huge and heavy. Two rotating cylinders aligned with two barrels, tipped with faintly-glowing iron sights. With one left thumb she popped the cylinder release, and the two cylinders flopped open. With her other left hand, she deposited a bullet of her own light energy into each chamber. With a flick of her wrist, she snapped the cylinders shut again, and aimed the oversized revolver at the emerald.

“Your move, partner,” said the fusion, standing firm.

“Is that supposed to intimidate me?!” Trapiche roared, charging at Turquoise. The fusion pulled the trigger and blasted Trapiche center mass. The hole that appeared was far larger than that created by Star Sapphire’s blaster, and the emerald’s regeneration seemed to heal it slower. The wounded Trapiche swung her rejuvenator, but Turquoise dashed into the air, hovering out of reach.

“You wanted me to change your mind, and I’m gonna give it all I’ve got,” Turquoise replied. 

“Then what’s _your_ solution?” Trapiche snarled, leaping up to attack the hovering Turquoise. The fusion dashed out of the way once more, and fired another round into Trapiche, punching a hole in her right thigh, straight through a band of her inclusion’s black flesh.

“You’re wrong about fossilization. I know what you went through made you lose hope, but you haven’t seen it all! People _can_ change,” Turquoise replied. “I’m living proof.”

“You’re sentimental,” Trapiche said, bolting forwards to slice at Turquoise with her arm blade. The fusion predicted the attack, and after dodging the blade, she dashed along the top of the emerald’s arm and kicked her in the face, causing her to stagger backwards.

“I’m _right_ ,” Turquoise said. “And if you destroy everyone, you destroy the possibility of them changing!” 

“Just _shut up!_ ” roared Trapiche, lurching forwards with a slash from her rejuvenator. Turquoise dove to the floor and fired up at the emerald, this time piercing through her left bicep.

“I know that the diamonds are flawed! I know that what they do hurts so many! But I know that they could change too! Pink was filled with emptiness and jealousy, and so she lashed out at you, just like how you’re lashing out at them! Don’t you see? It’s a cycle!”

The station’s floor began to vibrate as a loud hum filled the room. Trapiche lunged at Turquoise again, swinging her rejuvenator blade-first into the deck.

“It’s all I know,” the emerald wailed, tears running down her face as she pried her weapon back out of the floor. Frenzied, she unleashed a series of wild attacks, with Turquoise dodging every one before shooting through Trapiche’s right eye.

“Then open yourself up to a new possibility! It’s got to be out there!”

“No,” Trapiche said. “I have everything I need to create the future I want! I’m not going to give that away for the flimsy promise of something better!” She charged once more, her rejuvenator snapping forwards. Turquoise raised her revolver, fanning the hammer with her second left hand as her first pulled the trigger, unloading every chamber into the off-color emerald. Trapiche stopped in her tracks as the blasts ripped through her, dispersing what little was left of her physical form. As her face fizzled out, she glared at the fusion with her remaining eye.

“This isn’t over,” she wheezed. “Other rebels... will take my place… and they will bring this empire to... its... end...” With those last words, her physical form collapsed back into her gem, which Turquoise bubbled. She rushed towards the nearest cubicle full of peridots, reloaded her revolver, and blasted the energy shield until it fell. The technician gems scattered, but Turquoise easily caught one by the hand. 

“You’re gonna stop this thing from going off,” she ordered.

“I can’t,” the peridot replied, trembling in fear. “One the firing sequence has begun, it can’t be terminated!”

“How long does it have?”

The peridot looked back towards the monitor. “Forty-seven seconds,” she said, wrenching herself free.

“Looks like I’m on my lonesome for this one,” the fusion sighed. She raised her revolver upwards, firing a hole through the armor slats that blocked the skylight. The debris of the battle began to rush upwards as the room decompressed to the cold void outside. Turquoise placed Trapiche’s bubbled gem into Tsavorite for storage, and grabbed the still-inert Pink Diamond out of the air and followed likewise. She then pushed herself off the floor, and was sucked outside. The station spread out below her, nearly the size of a colony itself. Twenty huge mirror panels had opened wide along the outside of the central disk, looking not unlike unfurling rose petals. Each one was collecting the light of a million stars, and reflecting it in a beam towards the central spire.

“Pink Diamond really likes her flowers, doesn’t she,” Turquoise remarked idly. With her single right hand, the fusion grabbed the top of her revolver and pulled, splitting the single oversized weapon into a pair of identical ones. Her third eye danced in its socket, calculating the ranges and flight times of every projectile in every trajectory and every order they could be fired in. Turquoise wound up and spun in place, extending her weapons outward as she fired. Uncountable energy blasts rained outwards from her, destroying each mirror in sequence. She then turned back to the central spire, combined her revolvers again, and fired both barrels simultaneously, snapping the structure in half. Her work done, she descended back into the rapidly-decompressing ballroom. A few of the Galaxy Gem soldiers had regenerated their physical forms and clung to what surfaces they could to avoid the breach’s pull. 

“You idiot,” screamed an agate as she gripped a monitor desperately. “If the Refractor can’t fire off the energy it already collected, it’ll explode!”

“Oh,” Turquoise said. She raised her revolver and blasted open the door to the ballroom. “Then I suppose I ought to vamoose.”

“What even is a vamoose?” cried the agate as the monitor snapped underneath her, sending her hurtling out into space.

“Not sure,” Turquoise replied, dashing out of the room. She followed the hallways of the station until she encountered glyphs indicating escape pods. A horde of Galaxy Gems filled the pod bay, pushing and shouting at each other as they jockeyed for space in the escape pods. Turquoise aimed her revolver and poofed a path into the closest pod, sealed herself inside, and punched it, breaking away from the doomed station. Behind her, the broken petals of the colossal rose closed inward, before a wave of light ripped the artificial flower apart. Turquoise had never flown a starship before, but Star Sapphire had, so plugging in the coordinates for Homeworld was second nature to her. The escape pod lurched to hyperspeed as the debris from the ruined station rained down on Chatoyan 4.

* * *

As they entered Homeworld’s atmosphere, Turquoise split into her component gems.

“We did it,” Star Sapphire sighed.

“You know, I’m glad we crashed on that planet,” Tsavorite said, placing her hand on Star Sapphire’s. “We… could do this more often.”

“I’m all right with taking a break from adventures for a while,” Star Sapphire giggled.

“That’s fine too,” the garnet smiled.

The escape pod landed atop White Diamond’s palace, and the gems descended into the courts below. They arrived outside of White Diamond’s chamber, where two blue topaz guards stood silent.

“Are you ready?” Star Sapphire asked.

“No,” Tsavorite replied.

“Who’s there?” came the cooing call from within.

“It is Tsavorite and Star Sapphire, my Diamond,” said the topazes in unison.

“Send them in.”

The topaz guards each opened their side of the door, and Tsavorite and Star Sapphire proceeded inside. White Diamond towered above, her back turned to them as she watched a star map on a hologram display.

“I see that Pink’s little station was destroyed,” she said. “I suppose that will teach her to stop playing these tasteless pranks. Maybe she’ll finally embrace what it means to be a diamond.” She turned to her subjects, beaming both literally and metaphorically. “I take it you crushed the mutiny as well?”

“Yes, my Diamond,” Tsavorite said, kneeling. She drew the bubbled Trapiche from her gem and placed her on the floor. 

“Oh, to think that an emerald could turn against her own creators,” White Diamond sighed. “I’ll have her shattered. Well done. Say, you haven’t heard from Pink through all of this, have you? I assumed she was off pouting in her palace, but when I checked, she wasn’t there.”

Tsavorite felt despair fill her gem. She removed the bubbled Pink Diamond and held her aloft.

“She tried to intervene and stop the mutiny herself, my Diamond,” the garnet explained. “But the emerald attacked her with a rejuvenator.”

White Diamond picked up the bubbled gem with her fingernails as her smile disappeared. She examined the gem, furrowed her brow, and teleported the bubble away. 

“And you let this happen?”

“I couldn’t stop it,” Tsavorite admitted.

Star Sapphire’s hand wrapped around Tsavorite’s wrist. The garnet looked down as a tear trickled down the blue gem’s face. She had seen something.

White Diamond’s fury could be detected faintly under her calm composure. “Is there anything you two want to say for yourselves?”

Tsavorite relaxed, and felt her body and Star Sapphire’s flow together. Turquoise rose to her feet and looked up into White Diamond’s eyes.

“It’s been fun,” she said with a grin.

“Disgusting,” breathed White Diamond, who shattered the fusion beneath her heel. The diamond stepped back and turned up her nose at the fragments on the floor. With a clap of her hands, a pearl emerged into the chamber, bowing deeply.

“My Diamond,” said the pearl, saluting.

“Take these degenerates to Yellow,” said White Diamond, itching with revulsion. “She said she needed shattered gems for her geoweapon experiments.”

“Of course, my Diamond,” the pearl replied, bubbling the fragments before leaving. White Diamond relaxed as silence returned to the room. It’s not like Pink would lose much from being rejuvenated. Perhaps a fresh start would do her some good. Maybe, just maybe, she could be trusted with a colony-- if she learned her lesson first.

“Ah, the idea of her learning anything,” White mused, “That’s the funniest joke of all.”

As she chuckled, a sliver of pink entered her hue.

* * *


	8. Epilogue: Cold Fusion

Author's note: OK, I take that back, I'm writing an epilogue anyway.

**Several Thousand Years Later, Era 3**

Spinel rocketed around the corner, then tripped, bounced, and rolled to a stop in front of the door, grabbing her head to stop it from spinning. The rose quartz in front of her burst out laughing.

“Oh, wow,” she said. “I think you did, like, eight flips there! That’s a new record!”

Spinel sprung up to her feet and took a comically deep bow. 

“Please, please, hold your applause! I’ll shoot for ten flips tomorrow!”

“That will be something,” the rose quartz smiled. “Here for some more?”

“You betcha,” Spinel replied. “I think I’ll just go for two today. Yesterday had me… stretched thin!” she cackled, letting her arms droop to the floor before snapping them back into shape.

“Well, you go right ahead,” the rose quartz said, opening the door. “Pick any two you like!”

Spinel cartwheeled into the room. She had discovered it by accident a few weeks ago, and it had frankly terrified her. The pink-and-white marble room was filled with pedestals, each topped with bubbled gems. Some of the bubbles were blue, some of them were white, and others were yellow, but only a few were pink. All of them had been members of Pink’s court, bubbled for eternity awaiting discipline that never arrived, and now never would. They were all stuck in Era 1, and getting them up to speed was a task that required a  _ lot _ of enthusiasm. But the way Spinel saw it, she had enthusiasm to spare. 

“All right, all right! Step right on up, who’s gonna be first tooooday?” Spinel sang, twirling in the center of the room. Her audience remained silent.

“Gee, tough crowd,” she sighed. She closed her eyes and stretched her arms out blindly, retracting them back once she found two bubbles she felt were adequately bubbly. She opened her eyes. 

“Oooh, this should be fun,” she whispered. Two pink bubbles. One Lapis Lazuli, one Peridot. 

She skipped back out of the room, and let the rose quartz close the door behind her.

“Find something interesting?”

“Sure did, take a look,” said Spinel, holding the gems up to the guard.

The rose quartz looked confused.

“You got those from in there?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Spinel replied. “Where else would I have gotten them?”

“I thought the oubliette was just for members of Pink’s court,” the rose quartz explained. “These are Yellow cuts.”

“Huh,” Spinel mused. “I’m not sure what that means in this scenario.”

“Me neither,” said the rose quartz, shrugging as she returned to her post. “Have fun.”

Spinel tossed the bubbles into the air and began to juggle them. She stretched her head through the loop to wink at the rose quartz.

“I will,” she giggled.

“Maybe not that much fun,” the rose quartz said with a wince, afraid one of the bubbles could fall, but her warning fell on deaf ears as Spinel bounced back down the hallways.

Spinel arrived at her personal quarters, which were formerly Pink’s personal quarters. She was familiar with the space, and so she knew that the Pebbles would build a bed to catch her as she leaped into the center of the room. She bounced off the surface and settled onto the mattress, craning her head over the edge to peek at the Pebbles.

“Very nice work, very nice,” she grinned. “It’s springy like those Earth beds! Loooove it!”

The Pebbles cheered for their success, and quickly went back to work. Spinel returned her attention to the bubbled gems. 

“All right, time to wake up in the future,” she said, popping the bubbles. The gems glowed as their physical forms began to return. Spinel moved back on the bed, giving them some room as they took shape. 

The peridot regenerated first, definitely showing the form of an Era 1 cut. She was taller than Spinel by a decent margin, wearing a rugged uniform with heavy shoulder pads. Curiously, an insignia formed in the center of her uniform, a star surrounded by a swirling galaxy. Her gem rested in the center of her forehead, not dissimilar from the little Era 2 peridot from Earth, but the resemblance really ended there. Her hair formed an inverted triangle shape, widening as it ascended away from her head, and her visor narrowed to a sharp point above her nose. 

The Lapis Lazuli followed, the blue gem rising to its place in the center of her waist. She wore a short dress with geometric patterns radiating outwards from that same insignia. She was a very light blue in color, and her hair was a nearly-ethereal pixie cut. As she lighted on the floor, the ambient moisture in the air rushed to her, forming transparent segmented wings of water behind her back. The spectacle over, Spinel began her speech.

“Now, I know what you’re thinking-- ‘gosh, this sure seems weird,’ I bet,” she said, gesturing towards the gems. The peridot and lapis looked around the room with confusion, but when they saw Spinel, their expressions twisted into anger.

“Pink Diamond,” the peridot spat. “She sent her spinel to torture us!”

“I can’t believe she tricked us like that,” the Lapis said, distraught. “We’ll make sure she pays!” 

Spinel scooted backwards on the bed. “I think you’ve got the wrong idea,” she protested.

“Don’t listen to her,” the peridot warned. “This could be a trick too.”

“We’re not falling for it again,” said the Lapis with a scowl. The two gems shared a glance and took each other’s hands, their physical forms melding together in a spectacular light show. The fusion that emerged towered over Spinel and only seemed to have multiplied their suspicion and anger, a gleaming white angel of revenge with watery wings unfurled, preparing to advance.

“Gee willikers,” whispered Spinel. 

“I will cut down anyone that stands with the Diamonds,” the fusion roared, extending a hand towards Spinel. A segment of the fusion’s wings dissolved back into liquid water and raced forwards, wrapping around Spinel and pinning her to the room’s window.

“Maybe I should have led off with a riddle or something?” she smiled.

“I’ve heard enough of your nonsense,” the fusion hissed, increasing the pressure of the water. 

Spinel felt the glass behind her begin to fracture. “Now, stop me if you’ve heard this one before-- who has two thumbs and a long way to fall? Anybody?”

“I said, that’s  _ enough _ ,” the fusion snarled, forcing the water and Spinel through the window. For a moment, Spinel hovered in mid-air, perhaps suspended by a few particles of the manipulated water. She stretched her arms outwards in loop-de-loops and pointed her thumbs inward at herself.

“This gem!” she giggled. “Oh wait, I realize that’s not a good thing.”

Gravity finally took hold of her and she plummeted down from the palace. Above her, she saw the fusion emerge from the window and spread her wings.

“Mind your step!” Spinel called up to her as she fell. “The drop is a  _ doozy!” _

The fusion’s reply was to leap from the window and fly down towards Spinel. The pink gem bent her body to dodge the attack, then opened her arms wide to stabilize her descent. 

“Fun fact! This pit is  _ not _ bottomless!” she chirped.

“Then I’ll cut your fall short,” said the fusion, summoning a long blade made of water. She rose back up to Spinel and slashed, only for Spinel to spin out of the way. The elastic gem continued to stretch and twist and bounce away from every attack, infuriating the fusion further.

“Hold still!” she screamed.

“Who’s Still? Where is she? I’ll grab her,” Spinel guffawed. She glanced down, confirming that their fall was about to end. She just had to keep this up a little while longer.

“Enough!” the fusion shouted, her segmented wings splitting away from her body. They flew like missiles, seeking out Spinel. Each one exploded into a shower of water as they approached, forming floating bonds that locked around her lower body. The fusion raised her sword for a strike against her now-immobilized foe. Spinel slowly and subtly reached towards her own gem, moving only once she saw the sword begin to fall. The long sword clashed against Spinel’s freshly-summoned scythe, bouncing her out of her watery bonds. 

“Like it?” Spinel asked, pointing to the weapon. “You won’t bel- _ ieve _ how much begging it took me to get Bismuth to make this for me.”

“DIE!” the fusion screamed, splitting her wings into hundreds of watery missiles. Spinel stretched out her arms and twisted them together, forming a tight coil. Her arms’ elastic nature forced them to uncoil twice as fast, spinning the scythe into a blur as it turned the missiles into mist. 

“I mostly use it for jokes where I cut myself in half,” Spinel explained, sitting down on the length of the scythe like a bench as she fell. “They’re real  _ side splitters _ ! Get it?”

Canyon walls raced up around them as they fell past the city. Gem-shaped holes pock-marked the sides of the chasm as they descended.

The fusion dashed towards Spinel again, her sword slashing through several abandoned kindergarten holes as Spinel once again ducked away. “Do you ever shut up?” 

“Not really,” Spinel said. “It’s kinda my thing. That reminds me, we haven’t introduced ourselves. I’m Spinel,” she continued, rotating to fall head-first while extending a hand for a shake. 

The fusion slapped Spinel’s hand away and roundhoused the pink gem into the canyon wall. Spinel bounced off the surface, her momentum carrying her to the far wall of the chasm before bouncing back, then ricocheting further downwards. The fusion followed her down, where Spinel bounced off the canyon floor and hopped to her feet in time to block another slash from above.

“I get it, I get it,” Spinel said, as the ground buckled underneath the weight of the blocked attack. “Maybe you’re not into introductions. Well, we could play ice-breaker bingo!”

“Is this some game to you?” the fusion screamed, smacking Spinel away with the flat of her water sword.

“Yes, it is,” Spinel said as she bounced off of a pillar riddled with emergence holes. She looked up through the canyon to the stars above. She was right about the time of day-- she just had to hold on a little longer. “First off, you can check off a box if you have a tragic past! I do, so that’s one point for me. How about you?”

“I suffered for hundreds of years because of the Diamonds,” the fusion answered, slashing through the pillar while advancing towards Spinel. “To them, I was disgusting! My existence was a crime! And you would just laugh at me?”

“I want to make it clear that I’m not laughing  _ at _ you, just laughing  _ near _ you,” Spinel explained. “Also, you get to check off the ‘tragic backstory’ box. Up next is the ‘wanted to kill Pink Diamond’ box, and I think I can just put both of us down there, too. We’re neck and neck!”

The fusion paused.

“Wait… you… what?”

“Yep! It’s a long story, though. I could recite it for you in prose, or, ooh! How about a muuuuusical?”

“So… you’re not Pink’s lackey?”

Spinel pulled herself back to her feet. “Nope,” she grinned. “I’m a free gem, with my own life. We all are now. You too.”

The fusion stood still.

“And this isn’t one of your jokes?”

“It’s not, but I hope it makes you smile,” said Spinel. “Here, look,” she said, pointing behind her. A purple Pearl led a tour of assorted gems into the canyon. Her timing had been perfect after all. 

“During Era 2, off-color gems and fusions would flee into these abandoned Kindergartens for safety,” the Pearl explained to the tourists. “With the dawn of Era 3, these Kindergartens are now empty, and will be preserved as historical sites.”

“Era… 3,” the fusion whispered. “What even is that?”

“It’s right here and now,” Spinel explained. “Or wherever and whenever! That’s the amazing thing. This world can be whatever you want it to be.”

“I… I’m not sure that I understand,” the fusion said, returning her weapon to water droplets. 

“That’s okay. I know some people that can help explain everything to you,” said Spinel. “C’mon, there’s a galaxy warp not far from here-- oh, and am I ever going to get a name for you?”

“Pallasite,” the fusion replied. “I’m Pallasite.”

“Well nice to meet ya, Pallasite.” Spinel said, bowing deeply. “I’m sure they’ll tell the story over and over again-- it’s time for you to go and make some other friends.”

“Don’t sing.”

“Aww, geez,” the pink gem sighed. “I’ll just dance quietly.”

And so, dancing without singing, Spinel led the way up out of the kindergarten and into the future. 


	9. Epilogue 2: Gunfighter Ballads

Greg stumbled as the elevator reached the bottom floor, causing him to burn his mouth on his coffee. He tapped the sore spot on his mouth with his tongue and considered that there were far worse things to be burned by than pumpkin-flavored coffee. Perhaps he should even be honored, since the flavor was seasonal. Such a burn could only be experienced certain times of the year. He smiled at that conclusion, knowing that he was quite experienced with seasonal burns.

“Sorry I’m a little late. I stopped to grab some breakfast at the Big Donut,” he explained as he entered the subterranean facility. 

“I assume you got some of those… what are they, that you talk about? The odd dogs?” asked Yellow Diamond, concentrating on her work at her desk. She carefully moved a tiny gem fragment into place, as the broken pearl began to take shape. 

“Oh, hot dogs,” Greg replied. “They actually do sell hot dogs at the Big Donut. But today, I just got a scone and some coffee. I brought an extra in case you were interested.”

“What a nice gesture,” said the Diamond, continuing to assemble the damaged gem. “But I think I’m not ready to try eating yet.”

“I suppose it doesn’t help that Amethyst is your frame of reference on what eating is like.”

Yellow Diamond looked back over her shoulder. “I don’t understand.”

“You are  _ definitely _ not ready to try eating, then,” he sighed with a smile. 

“Thank you for doing this, Greg,” Yellow said. 

“What, all of this? It’s no problem. It’s felt good to really be able to contribute to the project. Even if it feels like I’m not doing much.”

Yellow stood up from her desk and looked out the reinforced windows. Beyond, the partially-dismantled Cluster glowed faintly.

“Your work is just as important as mine, Greg,” Yellow said. “I’ve hurt so many gems I can’t even count them. I might be able to put them back together, but I’m not always the right person to show them what the world is now.”

“It’s tough to reconnect with people that hurt you. Believe me, I get it. I only started checking in on my parents a couple months back,” Greg replied, sipping on his coffee, which had cooled. “It’s not always easy. So if you need me to give regenerated gems rides to the Little Homeworld, I’ll do whatever I can to help you out.”

“Thank you again, Greg,” said Yellow, sitting back down. “I finished two before you got here.” She picked up two inert gems from her work desk and reached down to place them in Greg’s free hand. 

“They’re still in there?” he asked.

“Taking their time, I suppose,” Yellow said. “Just keep an eye on them until they regenerate. Then, show them around like you always do.”

“You can count on me,” Greg said, heading back for the elevator.

* * *

“Hey, you guys take care,” said Steven, waving into the camera. 

“We will,” said Amethyst, waving back from her seat on the couch. “But you better not forget to send me that recipe for fried butter.”

“Okay, okay,” Steven chuckled. “I’ll text it to you.”

“Nice,” said Amethyst. 

“And you’ll call next week?” asked Pearl.

“He will,” said Garnet.

“Yes, I will,” he confirmed. “Love you guys.”

“We love you too, Steven,” said Garnet. The video call ended, and Garnet handed the phone back to Pearl. 

“What do you think will happen if I go off-recipe and use glue instead of butter?” Amethyst asked Garnet as the fusion rose from the couch and walked to the door.

“Nothing good,” Pearl groaned. 

“Greg is about to arrive with gems from the Cluster,” Garnet replied. “They will not be what we are expecting.”

Garnet opened the door as Greg walked in.

“You guys--” he said, breathing heavily from his sprint up from the van. “Check out who I’ve got.”

He placed the gems on the coffee table and stepped back.

“Normally, they’ve already formed when Yellow sends them to me. But they’re still in their gems, so you guys can tell me about them first before I make embarrassing mistakes with their names!”

Amethyst looked down at the gems, then back up at Greg. 

“I actually don’t know anything about these.”

Pearl leaned forwards on the couch, examining them closely. “Oh… that’s interesting.”

“What is it?” asked Greg.

“Well, as you know, many of the uncorrupted gems on Earth were formerly part of Pink Diamond’s court, before they rebelled and joined the Crystal Gems. And most of the gems you’ve been recovering from the Cluster were Yellow’s. But these… these are White Diamond’s gems. Look at their cut and finish-- exceptionally brilliant.”

“Yeah, but… what are their names? And what do they do? Maybe I can point them towards some hobbies or something,” Greg asked.

Pearl pointed at the blue gem. “This one is a Star Sapphire. You can tell because of the asterism, if you hold her up to the light. They were very high-ranking in the old caste system. I know that their future vision worked differently than other Sapphires.”

“They could see shorter distances into the future, but in greater detail,” Garnet explained, adjusting her visor.

“And the other one?” asked Greg.

“Well, this is a… oh, no,” Pearl whispered.

“Should I be worried? Should  _ we _ be worried?” Greg asked, raising his hands defensively.

“She’s a Tsavorite,” Pearl explained gravely. “They were garnets that…”

“You would call them a secret police,” Garnet explained to Greg.

“When the Diamonds didn’t like a gem, Tsavorites… cleaned up the problem,” Pearl continued. 

“These gems have been bubbled since, like, Era 1, right?” asked Amethyst, moving away from the coffee table.

“They’re going to be hostile,” said Garnet, stepping in front of Greg and summoning her gauntlets. “Get ready.”

“Careful, we’re trying to win hearts and minds here,” Greg warned.

“Still, I’m not taking any chances,” said Pearl, drawing her spear.

The gems began to glow and levitate as their physical forms emerged. 

“C’mon, we got this,” said Amethyst, summoning her whip.

The gems finished forming, and the white-hot light faded away. The Tsavorite was as tall as Garnet and athletically built, with White Diamond symbols marking her coat-tailed uniform. The Star Sapphire was slightly taller than the Sapphire they knew but just as slight, with short, neatly cut hair, and an ornate uniform with a shoulder cape.

“Galaxy Gems,” Tsavorite whispered, looking up at the insignias on gems surrounding her. In a flash, she drew her twinblades, and Star Sapphire summoned her blaster.

“Stand down,” Garnet ordered. “The universe is a different place from what you remember.”

Star Sapphire slowly pulled down on the trigger. “That sounds like something they would say.”

“You don’t need to worry about White Diamond anymore,” said Amethyst. 

“It’s not White Diamond I’m worried about, it’s all of  _ you, _ ” Tsavorite replied, charging towards the purple gem. Garnet dashed in and intercepted the attack by driving her left gauntlet into Tsavorite’s face, sending her flying through the beach house’s front window. The fusion quickly ducked back to dodge a spray of blaster fire from Star Sapphire, who floated back towards the newly-created exit. 

“Be careful, you guys,” said Greg as he hid beneath the kitchen table. “Don’t do something that--”

“We know what we’re doing,” Pearl interrupted, as she hurled her spear towards the retreating Star Sapphire. The blue gem dodged the attack and darted out of the broken window, heading towards the beach.

Tsavorite pushed herself back up, grimacing from the bruise on her cheek.

“You ok?” asked Star Sapphire, landing next to her.

“They’re strong,” the garnet answered. “We’ve got to be tactical about this.”

“Don’t you think this is all a little weird?” Star Sapphire asked. “The last thing I remember was… White Diamond.”

“And here we are now, I know,” Tsavorite said. “Something’s not right. But I imagine those Galaxy Gems were behind this.”

“No doubt,” Star Sapphire concurred. “They’re heading this way.”

The three gems emerged from the beach house and jumped down to the sand below.

“Amethyst, immobilize them,” Garnet ordered.

“Got it,” replied Amethyst, dropping into a spin dash. She raced forwards and circled the enemy gems, kicking up sand into an abrasive whirlwind that surrounded her opponents. Amethyst hopped out of the dash and cracked her whip towards her targets, hoping to entangle them. What she did not expect was the garnet catching the whip’s tail and yanking her back towards them.

“Behind you, fifteen degrees to the right,” Star Sapphire warned. Tsavorite threw the captive Amethyst in the specified direction, and she collided with Pearl as she dove into the whirlwind spear-first. The two gems sailed away, landing in the shallows nearby. Star Sapphire raised her blaster as she predicted an attack from the opposite side, and in a moment the largest gem broke through the sandstorm and into her line of fire. Garnet juked in time to dodge the blaster bolt, but this gave enough time for Tsavorite to whirl and face her. The fusion raised her gauntlets in time to block a downwards swipe from the combined twinblade.

“You’re a fusion,” Tsavorite observed.

“An  _ experience _ ,” Garnet corrected, lifting a leg to boot Tsavorite away. The green gem bumped into Star Sapphire, and the two exchanged a nod. Joining hands, they fused into Turquoise.

“Experience  _ this _ ,” said the new fusion, dropping her left hands to Tsavorite’s gem and summoning her revolver. Garnet hit the dirt as three blasts surged past overhead. 

“They  _ fused _ ?” Asked Amethyst, sprinting back up the beach.

“Fusions of different gems were unheard of in Era 1,” said Pearl, following alongside Amethyst as she pried an oyster out of her hair. “This doesn’t add up.”

Turquoise stood above the fallen Garnet, taking aim at center mass with her revolver.

“So I guess you got away with it, somehow,” Turquoise said, pulling back the hammers on the weapon with both left thumbs. “And I assume this is your Milky Way galaxy.”

Turquoise’s future vision alerted her to a projectile attack from behind. She spun, and with her right arm managed to catch a white-hot energy arrow, stopping the point just short of her chest. The arrow seared her fingers, the physical form of her right hand beginning to glitch as she tossed the attack aside. 

“What in tarnation,” she cursed, identifying her attacker as a tall, pale purple fusion wielding a recurve bow. Turquoise split her revolver, aiming the right weapon at Opal and the left at Garnet. 

“Well, looks like we’ve got ourselves a fusion standoff.”

“You’re outnumbered!” called Opal, reading another energy arrow.

“I’ve got sights on both of ya… Nah, I’d say  _ you’re _ outgunned,” said Turquoise, tracking her third eye back and forth between her targets.

Garnet pushed herself off the ground, using one arm to knock away Turquoise’s revolver as she hooked a leg underneath the enemy fusion and sent her spinning into the air. Turquoise used her levitation to correct her sudden skyward trajectory and aimed both weapons downwards, unleashing a barrage of energy blasts. Garnet darted through the hail of blaster fire and jumped towards Opal, the fusions enveloping each other in light.

“Mercy sakes alive,” Turquoise swore as the mass of light that was the forming fusion began to tower into the sky. The eight-limbed monstrosity that emerged roared defiantly, its face sliding up to reveal a bestial set of jaws beneath.

“I’m giving you one last warning,” said Alexandrite as her humanoid face clamped back down. “Stand down and let’s talk about this.”

“I don’t see much to talk about,” Turquoise replied. “You rebels blew up the home galaxy. I’m just doing my part to avenge every innocent life you took.”

“What are you talking about?” growled Alexandrite. 

“Stop waiting around,” said Alexandrite, twisting in place, “Let’s get her.”

“I knew something was wrong,” added Alexandrite, looking aghast.

The gigantic fusion swelled and popped back into its constituent gems, who landed with a thud on the beach.

“There’s been a misunderstanding here!” Pearl called up towards the hostile fusion.

“I’ll say,” panted Greg as he sprinted across the beach, losing a flip-flop in the process. In one hand he carried a paper bag.

“What are you doing?” asked Amethyst.

“My job,” replied the human, stopping below where Turquoise hovered. “Do you want a scone?”

“A  _ what _ ?”

“A scone,” Greg repeated. “It’s a food. For eating. With your mouth. From here on Earth!”

Turquoise floated down to the ground, her weapons still drawn. 

“What exactly are you?” she asked of the furry creature with the paper bag.

“Oh, me? I’m a human. We’re, uh, one of the native life forms.”

“You weren’t wiped out in the colonization?”

“No-- these gems here stopped the colonization,” Greg explained. “They risked everything to stop Homeworld from tearing this place up.”

“We are the Crystal Gems,” said Garnet, waving. 

Turquoise stood silent.

“Should we sing the song?” asked Amethyst.

“I don’t think we’re there yet,” said Pearl.

A single tear ran out from underneath Turquoise’s visor, soon followed by two more. 

“So… somebody did it,” she sniffled before falling to her knees. “Y’all found a better answer.”

“It’s not us you should thank for that,” said Garnet, walking over to the fusion. “But we’ll explain that later.”

“That might take a while,” Pearl said, looking up towards the setting sun. 

Greg scratched his head. “I tried to warn you guys-- I think you approached this the wrong way.”

“We were scared,” said Garnet, adjusting her sunglasses. “The last time we thought we had taken care of all our problems, new ones took us by surprise.”

“By getting defensive, we thought we could solve the problems before they started,” Amethyst continued. “But instead, we just made things worse.”

“It’s all right. Repairing broken relationships isn’t easy. For you guys, Era 1 is still something scary,” said Greg. “But you’ve got to ease your way into things. When I got back in touch with my parents, I invited them out for coffee, and we found things to talk about. It’s not simple, but if you take things slow, it’s easier.”

“Is this that scone?” asked Turquoise, lifting the pastry from the bag. 

“Oh, yeah, that’s it,” Greg said, wheeling to face the fusion again. “But if it’s your first time eating, you might want to--”

Turquoise shoved the scone into her mouth, chewed, and immediately split in two.

“Like a mouthful of sand,” said Tsavorite, spitting out crumbs indistinguishable from the actual sand beneath her.

“Oh, it’s got little sweet bits in it,” said Star Sapphire, her eye wide. “This is great!”

“--take that slow, too,” Greg sighed. “I think I’ll bring the van around, I’ve still got some beach chairs in there.” He looked back over at the Crystal gems. “Maybe you can make an evening of orienting Tsavorite and Star Sapphire here.” He paused for a moment, then turned back to the new gems. “Did I get those names right?”

Tsavorite wiped her mouth off with her wrist. “That’s right.”

“Yes!” chuckled Greg, pumping his fist in victory. “Star Sapphire, Tsavorite, welcome to Earth!” With a wave, he sprinted back across the beach, retrieving his lost flip-flop as he headed for the van.

“So, what’s the deal with this planet?” asked Star Sapphire, swallowing what remained of the scone. “It kind of reminds me of Chatoyan 4.”

“It was intended to be Pink Diamond’s first colony,” Garnet explained.

“Pink Diamond got a colony?” Tsavorite asked. “What kind of universe did we wake up in?”

Pearl beamed. “A better one.”


End file.
